Smoke, Drums and Stories On Skin
by SereneCalamity
Summary: Clary is a tattoo artist who is quickly becoming obsessed with the drummer of a new band she's discovered through her friend. Jace is interested in finding all of the stories on her skin, both the ink, and otherwise. Clace.
1. Chapter 1

_Hey, guys! Time for a new story! I actually started this one about two years ago, I think, it just took me a while to get myself into the flow of things. I hope you guys enjoy it :)_

 _Disclaimer: I do not own the characters._

"I'm pretty sure I would get pregnant if I sat down on one of these booths," Clarissa Morgenstern stated with a raise of a pierced eyebrow as she looked around. It wasn't really an insult to the establishment that they were in, more of an observation. Magnus Bane let out a laugh as he slung an arm around her shoulder and pulled her in close, brushing his lips against her ear, touching the metal studs that were lined up and down the lobe.

"Trust me, you won't regret this," he promised her.

"Yeah, yeah," Clary rolled her eyes, but she was grinning, and she reached out to grab at Simon Lewis' hand, making sure the three of them didn't get separated in the throngs of people. The air was saturated with the smell of cigarettes and weed and alcohol and sweat, but Clary didn't mind, it sort of just smelt normal to her. The room felt thick and heavy, and Magnus lead the way into the mosh pit of people who had gathered in front of the stage.

"Hey, pretty girl," came a growl from next to Clary and she turned her eyes to the man who was standing there. He was attractive, yeah, but he had this leer in his eyes, and Clary instantly leaned forward to kiss Simon hard on the mouth, making it clear she wasn't interested.

"Sorry," she shot at the man. "Taken." The man glanced Simon up and down, who was more than used to playing the role of Clary's boyfriend when she was being hit on, straightened his back and put an arm around Clary's shoulders. He leaned in and kissed her again, and Clary let her body fall forward slightly against his. The man huffed and shifted his attention on to a blonde with bright pink and purple streaks through her hair. "Ick," Clary made a face at his back and then shuffled around so that she standing between Magnus and Simon. "Pervs."

"Oh yes," Magnus smirked down at her, pursing his glossed lips together. "It must really suck being a hot piece of ass." Clary threw up the finger at him before focusing her eyes back on the stage.

"What time does your man come on?" She asked distractedly, needing to raise her voice to be heard over the music that was pounding through the speakers and the shouting from the crowd.

"They'll be on in about five minutes!" Magnus shouted back at her. A few weeks ago, Magnus had met a boy at a club and had gone off the grid for almost five days. It wasn't often that Magnus went back to any of his one night stands, but he seemed pretty taken by this one, and it hadn't taken much to convince Simon and Clarry to come along to a night when their band was performing at a bar downtown. It wasn't a bar that Clary came to often—actually, she was pretty sure she had never come here before—although maybe she would come here in the future. It wasn't overflowing with a bunch of girls in tiny tee-shirts and there wasn't fancy pink drinks with little umbrella's being served.

She liked the smell of weed and alcohol, it smelt like her apartment, and the music they were playing were the Dead Kennedys, which wasn't played in the average night club, so she appreciated that. While the atmosphere might not be everyone's sort of thing, she liked it, it kind of turned her on.

"Alright, alright, alright!" Came a scream into the microphone, a petite blue haired girl taking centre stage in front of the thick curtain that was shielding the rest of the stage from the audience. "We've got one of the local favourites on tonight!" A cheer went up from the crowd, a thundering against Clary's eardrums. "So without making you fuckers wait any longer, let's welcome _Downworlders_ onto the stage!" The screams and cheers and clapping got even louder and Clary let out a laugh, flicking her tongue out so that that piercing clicked against her tongue. The curtain drew back and revealed the band standing behind it.

"That's him," Magnus nudged Clary in the side, maybe a little bit too roughly because she was thrown off balance slightly. "Lead singer." Clary's eyes instantly narrowed in on the man standing in the front and she smirked, able to see exactly what Magnus saw in the man in front of the microphone. He had dark hair with streaks of purple through it, and his eyes were rimmed in dark kohl. He was wearing a pair of tight black jeans and a white, sleeveless tank top that had low cut arm holes, showing off plenty of tanned skin underneath.

He was fucking gorgeous.

If Magnus wasn't head over heels, Clary would be making a move after the gig. She finally let her eyes move to the others who were on stage with him, and she rolled her eyes, because of _course_ , they were all as beautiful as Magnus' man. There was a pretty girl who had similar features to the lead singer, and she had purple and blue streaks through her long hair, one side shaved close to her head. She had a hoop through the corner of her lip, and two in one of her eyebrows and a guitar in her arms. Then there was a boy who's hair was entirely dyed red and he had gauges in both ears and a spike through his lip and he had a bass guitar. There looked like there were a hundred thick silver rings around his fingers as he tapped his hand against the instrument.

And then, holy shit.

Then there was the drummer.

The _drummer_.

Clary was pretty sure her panties were wet all the way through.

He had blonde hair that was shaggy, almost reaching his shoulders, and unlike the rest of his band mates, it was only the one colour, but he still fit in perfectly with the rest of them. He had a sleeveless black tank top on that showed off his biceps and broad shoulders, and there were tattoo's curling up and down his arms. Clary wanted to lick them. There was a cigarette in the corner of his mouth and smoke curling up around his face, and he had two studs under his lower lip on the right hand side, and then a ring in the left side. On a lot of people that would be overkill, but he pulled it off. He pulled it off well. Then there was the ring through his eyebrow and two more in one of his ears.

And he kept spinning the drum stick in one of his hands, through his long fingers, around and around.

The things that Clary wanted those fingers to do to her.

"I want one," she whimpered into Magnus' ear, and her friend let out a laugh.

"Shit, Red, keep it in your pants," he teased her. "His name is Jace, I'll introduce you after."

"I'll love you forever," Clary promised, tucking her hand into the bend in his arm.

"Yeah you will," Magnus smirked and then they both went quiet when the lead singer leaned into his microphone.

"Hey, everyone. We're _Downworlders_ , and we want to say thank you for coming out tonight!" He spoke quickly and didn't really look at the crowd, a few bright blue curls fall in front of his face, before another cheer went up and suddenly the drummer was slamming his sticks against his drum set.

They were good.

The group had chemistry between them, which could be seen in the way they moved with each other and spoke between songs and touched one another. It was the same sort of way that Magnus and Simon moved around her. Mainly, the band did covers; a mixture of genres with their own rock twist on it, sometimes changing up the words a little. There were two original songs thrown in there as well, which weren't bad at all. Clary was getting jostled as everyone jumped and sang along, and she was more than happy to join in. When they finished, it was the girl who spoke into one of the microphones.

"Thank you so fucking much! You guys are amazing!" She screamed, and she flicked her hair over her shoulder. "We'll see you next time!" Simon was blinking up at the girl, his eyes wide behind the thick rimmed hipster glasses he was wearing and Clary laughed at him, nudging him in the ribs with her elbow. The four of them filed off stage, and then the next band was being introduced.

"Okay, come on," Magnus pulled on Clary's arm. "Let's go." They somehow managed to get to the side of the mosh pit, both boys sheltering Clary in the middle although there was still a lot of sweat that got transferred and some shoves and pushes from people. They got around to the side where there was a door and a burly bouncer standing there, his arms crossed over his chest. "Uh, we're with the band?" Magnus raised his eyebrow. "My name's Magnus." For a moment, it looked as though the bouncer wasn't going to move. But then he gave a short nod and stepped aside. Magnus turned to wiggle his eyebrows at Clary and Simon before leading them behind the stage. The music coming from the stage wasn't quite as loud, the walls must have something noise cancelling built into them, but it was still loud enough for them to make out each word of the song now playing.

"Magnus!" Came a shout and Magnus picked up the pace, running directly toward the tall, dark haired man with purple streaks in his hair. The kiss they exchanged looked filthy and Clary smirked as she glanced them up and down. When they pulled apart, the man looked over Magnus' shoulder with a raised eyebrow, his hazel eyes sweeping over Clary and Simon. "These your friends?" He asked.

"This is my Clary, and my Simon," Magnus replied as he half turned to look back at them. Simon made a stammering noise under his breath, which was typical of him, and Clary stepped up to give a little half wave.

"Hey. You guys kicked ass," she complimented and there was a small smile pulling at the corner of his full mouth.

"I'm Alec," he introduced himself, rather unnecessarily. The hot red haired bass guitarist strolled over to them, an interested look on his face as he stared past Magnus, past Clary, and straight at Simon. Simon shuffled from side to side but met the man's eyes unabashedly, biting down on his lower lip.

"Because that's not totally obvious or anything," Clary said under her breath to Magnus, who snorted.

"Yo, Alec!" There was a yell from behind the red haired man and Clary felt the nerves in her body light on fire as the gorgeous golden haired drummer suddenly appeared, his tongue playing with the ring in the corner of his mouth. The tease of the tip of his tongue undoubtedly made her pupils dilate and she was glad that the lighting was dark and wouldn't show up the slight blush on her cheeks. "You ready to head out of here? We gotta pick up Max." He seemed to realize that his friend wasn't alone because he tilted his head to take in the three extra's and when his eyes landed on Clary there was an unmistakable up and down look before giving her a slow, sensuous smirk.

"Yeah, I know," Alec Lightwood sighed as he turned back to Magnus. "Sorry, we need to rush out. Thanks for coming."

"Sure thing, pretty eyes," Magnus flirted. "I'll send you a text when I'm free next so we can...Meet up." Clary snorted and Magnus shot her a look.

"I will," Alec grinned boyishly, glancing back at Simon and Clary. "Nice meeting you guys. I'll see you around some other time."

"Same here," Clary answered, although her eyes quickly shifted back to the drummer, who was still staring at her with that ridiculous smirk that she wanted to eat off his face, and suck on the piercings in his lip. When he turned to follow after Alec and the bass guitarist, he glanced over his shoulder one last time before they were out of view.

 _Hope you guys enjoyed! Let me know what you think x_


	2. Chapter 2

**Hey, my beautiful, wonderful readers! It's early February, so as promised, here's an update! I hope you guys have had an amazing past few months, and I hope you're still interested in these stories! Just a quick heads up that I've uploaded some oneshots, and I do still have a couple to post, but I had so many requests to update my multi-chapters, so I thought I would update these before continuing with my editing, so there are some more to come!**

 **Anyway, here we go...**

It was quiet this afternoon, which Clary was grateful for. She didn't have anyone booked in from two o'clock onwards, and so she was going to work on a tattoo design for a woman that she was going to be inking next week. It was a woman she had tattooed before about a year ago when her daughter was first born, and she was actually adding onto the one that she had originally done. Kaelie Whitewillow dealt with the piercings, and there were still people coming in during the afternoon to see her, but they were all walk ins. Magnus was also a tattooist, like Clary, who would usually be in the room next to her, however he wasn't working today.

 _"Would you bleed for me? Lick it off my lips like you needed me_?" Clary sung out as she moved around her back room of the tattoos parlour, tapping her fingers against the surfaces she was passing. " _Would you sit me on the couch, with your fingers in my mouth—_ "

"Clary?" It was Magnus' voice behind her and Clary didn't bother to turn around as the chorus started, wiggling her fingers over her shoulder by way of greeting at her friend.

" _Let's cause a little trouble_ ," she finally started to turn around, twirling her charcoal pencil in her fingers. " _Oh, you make me feel so weak_ —" she broke off when she realized that it wasn't just Magnus standing there.

It was the drummer.

Jace.

The one who looked like he had magic fingers.

"What's up?" She raise an eyebrow at them, not particularly embarrassed with being caught, but definitely surprised. She hadn't expected to see him around so soon. "And what are you doing here on your day off?"

Or here.

She hadn't expected to see him _here_.

"You remember Jace?" Magnus' voice had a slight teasing lilt to it, and if they were alone, she would grab his nose ring and give it a painful tug. "The drummer from the band that Alexander's in?"

"I do," Clary nodded and then tilted her head to the side, playing with the metal ball in her tongue, tapping it against her teeth and letting her gaze run languidly up and down the beautiful drummer. He was doing the exact same thing back at her, and he was playing with the metal ring in the corner of his mouth, similar the way that she was playing with her tongue piercing.

"He knew that I worked at a tattoo parlor, and wanted the recommendation of the best tattooist in the city," Magnus smirked at her. "Naturally, I told him myself, however I wasn't working today, so I thought that he might want to...Check _you_ out." There was so much innuendo packed into Magnus' tone that there was no way in hell Jace could miss it even if he didn't know Magnus and his teasing ways, and Clary rolled her eyes.

"Whatever, Mags, fuck off and I'll talk to him," she said, making it out as though she was doing her friend some huge favor, when in reality, it was the other way around.

She really hoped that he wanted her to consult for a tattoo somewhere under his shirt.

Or under his pants.

Or they could scratch the tattooing thing all together, and just let her get into his pants and onto his cock.

"I'll see you later, babe," Magnus sung out before disappearing. She could vaguely hear him and Kaelie talking outside, but her attention full shifted to rest on the drummer.

Jace.

Beautiful Jace.

"So what can I help you with today?" Clary asked, pulling over a stool from the a few feet away and settling on it, hooking her ankles behind the metal legs. "Are you looking at a whole new tattoo, or adding onto one?" Jace gave her an easy smile as he entered the room, pulling at one of the other stools and stopping it directly in front of her, straddling it and lazily folding his arms across his chest. He was wearing skinny jeans with a rip in one knee and a tee shirt that tightened across his biceps and chest when he folded his arms, showing off most of the tattoo on one of his arms.

"Adding to one," he told her. Without any further preamble, he straightened up on the stool and gripped the hem of his shirt, pulling it over his head and letting it fall to the ground. Clary couldn't help the way her pupils dilated, and she didn't doubt for a moment that he saw the way the exposure of his torso affected him, because he grinned at her and wiggled his eyebrows.

"Stand up," Clary said, crooking her finger at him. "And let me look." Jace seemed a little surprised at how forward she was being, maybe he thought that she was going to act shy, but he got off the stool and stepped toward her. He turned side on so that she could get a proper look at the tattoo. Despite how gorgeous he was, and how amazing he smelt, as soon as she slipped into artist mode, he became a canvas, and she could switch off the fact that she wanted to climb this man like a tree. At least temporarily. "This is amazing," she commented as she wrapped her hand around his wrist and turned his arm and lifted it to get a proper look at the tattoo. It was all in black ink, which was unusual for such a large tattoo, and there was so much more detail to it than what she had thought when she had caught a glimpse of it at the live show.

On the inside of his arm was a tree, coloured in dark so not just an outline, with it's roots starting on his hand, around his wrist and inching onto his palm and the back of his hand for several centimeters. The trunk climbed steadily up his arm, with branches extending out, toward other tattoo's that clearly had meaning. There were musical notes, and several initials, what looked like a licence plate for a vehicle, a flower, a detailed feather, two different dates, an old fashioned microphone, an intricate design of an eye with lashes curling upward—and probably more that Clary hadn't registered yet.

"This is amazing," Clary repeated, not even caring that she sounded breathy. She traced her finger over the piano music that curled around his bicep, pressing down on his tanned skin as she followed down the trunk of the tree. She heard him take in a breath as her thumb brushed over the feather that was on the inside of his forearm, but she chose to ignore it. Long minutes past by, but Jace didn't pull his arm away, letting her study the memories that were etched into his skin even if she didn't understand them all. Finally she let her hand drop away and tilted her head to the side. "They've all been done at different times, right?" Even though the tattoo's were all done incredibly, to the trained eye, she could detect the different strokes and style of art work.

"Yeah, I've been adding to it since I was seventeen," Jace agreed.

"They're absolutely incredible," Clary stated. "I'm guessing they all mean something?"

"More or less," Jace nodded once, his chin jerking forward. "I mean, there's a couple which could definitely mean _more_ , but I still love them, and I don't regret them." There was something about the way that he wasn't letting go of her gaze that was making Clary's skin heat all over. She gave him a quick smile and cleared her throat.

"At least you didn't go somewhere cheap when you were starting out—you know, when you were a teenager," Clary noted as she looked at what she assumed was the oldest ink, over his wrist.

"God, yes," Jace let out a huff of a laugh. "My dad's a fucking ass, but at least he's useful. He was all about throwing money at problems to try and make them go away, so he paid for a bunch of them unknowingly."

"Thank god for douchebag parents," Clary joked, and Jace grinned at her. His golden eyes danced a little, and she noted under the bright lights from the overhead lamps that were directed toward the centre of the room where she did the tattooing. "So what was it that you were thinking about adding to it?"

"Two words," Jace said, digging into his pocket for a scrap of paper. "And then this drawing, but obviously this is just a shitty sketch, you'll need to touch it up." Clary took the piece of paper from him and flattened it out. _Carpe noctem_.

"Isn't the saying _carpe diem_?" She asked with a raise of one eyebrow.

" _Carpe diem_ means 'seize the day'. _Carpe noctem_ is 'seize the night', which applies more to me," he replied. Clary just nodded as she kept looking at the paper. It looked like a pocket watch, with the numbers three, six, nine and twelve in numerals, and inside the outline of the watch and the numbers was the New York skyline. The top was filled in dark and then faded out near the bottom. It was definitely only a rough sketch, but she got an idea of what he was going for.

"Okay, uh, give me a couple of minutes, okay?" Clary mumbled without looking at him as she spun around in the stool she was on and pulled her sketch pad over and picked up a pencil. She leaned against one of the tables that ran along the wall, and bent forward to begin her sketch. Jace moved around a little behind her, probably putting his shirt back on, but then he went quiet. She wasn't paying much attention, as her pencil skimmed over the page, quickly redoing it with more skill. She would do it again before they actually went through with a tattoo, but she needed to make sure she was on the right track first. She turned around, holding up her pad and showing it to him. "Is this the sort of thing you were thinking?" She asked. Jace took the pad from her and looked at it with a smile.

"Absolutely," he murmured. "It's perfect." He looked up at her, pulling his lower lip into his mouth, sucking on that ring in the corner of his mouth. The look in his eyes shifted into something almost predatory and Clary swallowed hard as his gaze settled over her. He held the pad back out to her, but when she took it, he didn't let go of his side. "So when can I make a date?"

"A date?" Clary questioned, her lips curling into a half smile.

"For the tattoo," Jace clarified, although he was smirking right back at her, and Clary didn't doubt that he was also talking about something other than the tattoo as well. But he was going to need to ask properly if he was after something more than her ink.

"Just head out to the front desk," Clary gave him an innocent smile, widening her big, green eyes. "Kaelie's out there, and she does all the bookings." Jace grinned at her and nodded, finally letting the pad go so that she could put it down on the table. Her eyes drifted down to his ass as he walked away, toward the door. Before leaving, he turned around as though to say goodbye, and completely caught her checking him out. His grin widened even more, and he lifted two fingers to his forehead and gave her a little salute, and then disappeared.

 **Right! So, here's the super, super long A/N—sorry! I had a great Christmas and New Years time, not really doing much, just spending time at the beach and with my husband and with some of best friends. This year has started well, there's been a few bad days, but hey, happens to everyone. I hope your year has started just as good, and you spent it with family and friends if that's what you prefer, and that you spent it alone and quiet if that's what you prefer.**

 **I wanted to say that I managed to get around to most of peoples oneshots, at least the ones that struck a chord with me because some of prompts just aren't the type that I can write, and I had fun with the ones I wrote! You can still send me prompts or requests through the year, and I try and get to them near the end of the year when I focus on oneshots. Can be in a huge variety of fandoms, just ask me :)**

 **On with the recommendations!**

 **TV Shows: _Roswell: New Mexico_. Well. I loooved the original series, even if I can see a lot of flaws in it when watching it now back to when I was a teenager. I'm enjoying the reboot so far, I really like the change up in Liz, and Michael's relationship with Alex. I love that Tyler Blackburn from Pretty Little Liars is in it, and Michael Trevino from Vampire Diaries, because he was one of my favourite characters from VD. Anyway. Fingers crossed it goes well. And I intensely ship Max/Liz already, and not because I know they're supposed to get together, but because I love their chemistry, which is more than the original series, at least for my side. Oh and _The Runaways_ Season 2! I liked Gert a lot more in this one. Ooh, and _Sex Education_. That show is absolutely brilliant. Like, insanely brilliant. I'm so glad it's been renewed for another season. I also started watching _The Following_ for the hundredth time because this show is amazing.**

 **Music: _6 Figures_ by Kings, _Run Away With Me_ by Carly Rae Jepsen, _Old News_ by Mitch James, _Wasted_ by Jesse McCartney and _Bad_! by XXXTENTACION. Ooh, and _Saturday Nights_ by Khalid, _Bury A Friend_ by Billie Eilish and _Wild Enough_ by Elina.**

 **Movies: _Tomb Raider_ , which I watched for the second time the other week and I quite enjoyed it, a lot more than the first time I watched it. Alicia Vikander is a babe. Also _How To Train Your Dragon 3_. Holy shit. I knew this one was going to get me in the feels, but I didn't expect to cry twice. It was beautiful. Also the new _Robin Hood._ Maybe I'm biased because I love Taron Egerton, but I didn't think it was anywhere near as bad as what the reviews said. I know it wasn't great, but I still enjoyed it, and Marian was a badass.**

 **Now, I've got some questions! Thought I'd change things up a little this year.**

 **So; what is your favourite song right now? Mine would be a tie between _Run Away With Me_ by Carley Rae Jepsen and _Back To Life_ by Hailee Steinfield.**

 **What is...Your favourite movie that you've seen recently? Mine would be _Spiderman: Into The Spiderverse_.**

 **Aaaand what is your favourite fandom to read in? For me it would be a tie between the DC fandom and _Harry Potter_ right now, although it changes frequently.**

 **Talk to me, let me know what you thought and answer the questions if you feel inclined to!**


	3. Chapter 3

"Okay! Let's go back to the top!" Alec shouted out.

"No!" Isabelle Lightwood snapped, shaking out her wrists and running a hand though her hair. "I need a smoke break!" She was in a bad mood, and her and Raphael Santiago had been snipping at each other the whole afternoon, ever since they had started their practice at four, which undoubtedly meant that they had gotten into some sort of lovers spat last night, because yesterday things had been fine between them. But then they were always getting into arguments every other day, just before they fell back into bed together, so they weren't really concerned about it.

"You gonna go after her and try to sort this shit out?" Alec grunted at Raphael, who was still standing there, plucking at his bass guitar. He made a face at Alec, but took off the strap of his guitar and walked after Isabelle. "I'm so fucking over those two."

"You're just over anyone who's doing your sister," Jace smirked.

"Yeah, well, I don't expect you to understand," Alec scrunched up his nose in Jace's direction, and the golden haired boy just shrugged and laughed. The two of them were quiet for a couple of minutes—Alec fiddling with around on his phone while Jace picked up a pencil and made a couple of adjustments to a new song he was writing. Alec's phone let out a loud ping, announcing a text, and a second later, there was a grin on his face.

"Magnus?" Jace guessed knowingly.

"Mm," Alec mumbled as his thumbs raced over the keys to respond. Jace snorted at the expression on his cousins face as he waited until Alec had finished his message and looked up.

"Are you ever gonna actually ask him out?" Jace raised an eyebrow.

"Yeah, we'll see," Alec shrugged noncommittally.

"Come on, man! You're kind of obsessed," Jace dropped his pencil and the ragged looking notebook he had been scribbling in, twirling one of his drumsticks around between his fingers. "And he seems pretty into you—came to the show the other night, and you've been at his place all the time. And I know you're not getting with anyone else, and it's been a while, right? That sounds kind of serious?" Alec smile had faded slightly and he shrugged. Jace frowned at the expression. "What is it?"

"I don't really know if he's into the whole relationship sort of thing," he admitted quietly.

"What—you asked him?"

"No," Alec muttered.

"Then how do you know?" Jace asked pointedly.

"Just some of the things he's said...I mean, that first night that we hooked was great—"

"Given the two of you disappeared for almost a whole week and called in sick to work so that you could have a five day sex fest, we all kind of gathered that it was great," Jace smirked.

" _But_ ," Alec continued with a glare in Jace's direction. "It's only been a month. And I know that he wasn't planning on a relationship when we first started fooling around, because when we were having dinner one night, he mentioned something about an ex-girlfriend getting too clingy, and said that he was damn happy being single. So...That sort of makes it seem like he doesn't want something exclusive?"

"That means that he didn't want to be with that last chick," Jace pointed out. "How are you going to know if that applies to you unless you ask?" Alec just huffed under his breath and went back to focusing on his phone. Jace rolled his eyes at his angst ridden cousin and looked back down at his notepad. Isabelle and Raphael came stalking back in a couple of minutes later, neither of them looking particularly happy, but at least they picked up their instruments and got in position to start playing.

It was almost eleven o'clock before they all broke off rehearsal, Isabelle and Raphael seeming to be in a better place now, because they went off with their arms wrapped around each other, and Alec had gotten a call from Magnus, asking to meet up. Jace was left to lock up the garage—a garage that they were lucky enough to have a boss who let them use for practice. Jace and Alec worked part time at the garage and Hodge Starkweather let them practice in the garage as long as they didn't get too many noise complaints. Afterwards, Jace got on his motorbike, strapping on his helmet and pulled away from the curb of the road, deftly navigating his way through the New York traffic.

Clary.

She was _gorgeous_.

Her eyes were vibrant green, her hair was dyed a dark red colour, and the tattoo's up and down her arms and piercings in her ears and nose.

Okay, so maybe she didn't _look_ like anything particularly special. This was New York, there were a hell of a lot of pretty girls around, and a lot of them were more than happy to throw themselves at Jace. During his late teens and the first few years of his twenties, he had made his way through a lot of those pretty girls.

But there was this energy about her that drew him in and made him want to get to know her better, and was what he wanted to chase after.

It had been nearly six months since he had slept with anyone, and even though the tension that came to him when he was alone in the shower or when he was drunk, stumbling back to his apartment, was becoming slightly unbearable, but after his last girlfriend, he was being a bit more careful this time. Besides, the tension was able to be staved off by his left hand, even if it wasn't the most satisfactory of options.

His last girlfriend, Lydia Branwell, had seemed like a sweetheart. She wasn't quite as into the whole band scene as he was, and apart from one stud in each ear and a tiny tattoo of the her little sisters birth date on her hip, she had no other body modifications. She wasn't typically the girl that he went after, but they had got on well. She had a job as a manager in a retail outlet and was going through University to get a journalism degree. They had dated for over a year, almost fifteen months, until he found out that she had been cheating on him pretty much the whole time. Lydia had told him that she had been in a long term relationship that had ended when she left high school and went off to University, but it seemed as though a couple of months after she and Jace got together, the old boyfriend had shown up and they had rekindled.

Jace's father had cheated on his mother almost all his life, and it had ruined her life. As a rule, he stayed as far away from people like that as possible, and then he had unwittingly shared a bed with one for over a year.

There had been a couple of one night stands after her, and then Jace had decided to just be by himself for a while. It wasn't that he didn't enjoy the whole one-and-done routine, but he had liked what he had had with Lydia while it had lasted. He liked getting to know someone and them getting to know him, and the whole thing not being a sloppy, alcohol fused encounter. It wasn't necessarily that he wanted a girlfriend, more just like...a girl that was his friend and who he could have regular sex with.

Unfortunately, there wasn't really anyone who fit that criteria, so here he was, six months later, returning home to an empty apartment.

* * *

"Honey, I'm home!" Clary sung out as she opened the front door to her apartment, knowing that Simon was inside, even though he had a particularly nice apartment of his own just one block away. Simon grinned up at her from where he was sprawled out on her couch, flicking through the Netflix menu, looking for something to settle on. "What we watching?" She asked as she dropped her bag to the ground and kicked off her shoes.

"I was thinking _Narco's_?" He suggested. "Maybe _The Last Kingdom_?"

"Why are we going for something serious?" Clary pouted as she shrugged out of her jacket and then flopped down onto the arm chair beside the couch, her designated seat. "What about... _That 70's Show_?"

"Or we could go for a movie?" Simon began as Clary began pulling off the bracelets around both of her wrists, and unhooking her watch. Simon gave her a long look out of the corner of his eye as the multiple bracelets—woven leather, beads, linked chains—the multiple bracelets that she always wore before looking back at the TV. "How about _Hot Fuzz_? I'm always down for some Simon Pegg."

"Sounds good," Clary grinned and propped her feet up on the coffee table. "Ooh, guess who came into the shop today?"

"Who?" Simon lifted an eyebrow at her as he selected _Hot Fuzz_ from the list.

"Jace, the hot drummer," Clary wiggled her eyebrows as she rubbed her fingers absentmindedly over the skin of her wrists after they had been wrapped up all day. "He wants me to add to his tattoo."

"And I bet you're just jumping at the chance to get your hands on his skin," Simon smirked.

"You know me oh so well," Clary's grin widened. "The art work he already has is pretty damn gorgeous to be honest, at least he's been getting it done at good places rather than any of the shitty stuff." The movie started and Simon wriggled into a more comfortable position and folded his arms under his chin to prop his face up. "Anyway, he's given me a sketch. I'll work on it tomorrow, look at adding to it."

"So are you going to have him pay for this piece of art work in sexual favors?" Simon joked.

"Hey! I'm a complete professional, I'll have you know!" Clary protested. "Besides," she tilted her head to the side. "You know that Kaelie would never forgive me for doing a client when she had a a total thing for that blondie who kept coming in for more eyebrow piercings and we banned her from seeing him."

"You and Magnus didn't ban her from seeing him because he was a client," Simon pointed out. "You banned him from seeing her because the only reason he kept coming back for piercings was because the dude was a low grade stalker."

"True that," Clary scrunched up her nose. "To be totally honest, Kaelie has an absolutely horrific sense in men, and should only ever listen to me or Magnus before she sleeps with anyone. _Ever_." The two of them fell quiet for a long few minutes, watching as Simon Pegg was bounced through management as he tried to determine who it was that was ordering him out of the city, and then Simon spoke again, his words mumbled.

"I thought that bass guitarist was pretty hot." Clary grinned and picked up a cushion, throwing it at her friend.

"How weird would that be?" She laughed. "Magnus and Alec, me and Jace, you and the red haired guy."

"I think you might be jumping to conclusions there," Simon rolled his eyes. "Besides, Magnus likes Alec a lot, I think he's actually going to ask him out. Whereas I simply want to get into the guitarist pants. And we all know that's all you want from the drummer as well, given your no dating rule and all."

"Eh, who likes dating?" Clary made a face. "Eighty percent of people date just for the sex afterwards. It's much more fun if everyone is just up front with what they want, right from the start."

"I'm pretty sure those statistics are completely wrong," Simon quirked an eyebrow at her and Clary just stuck her tongue out at him. "So is that what you're going to be with him? Up front with what you want?"

"We'll see how things go," Clary shrugged with a smirk.

 **I've written this about four times now, and I'm just going to keep it simple.**

 **On the 15th of March 2019, there was a terrorist attack in my beautiful country, New Zealand. This is the first ever mass shooting on this level during peace time in the beautiful islands that I have spent my whole life in.**

 **This doesn't happen here. We don't have mass shootings. We don't have a fear of one another to the point where it drums up anger that turns to hate.** **In the words of our absolutely incredible Prime Minister, " _They are us_."**

 **We are all one people, and we can't let hate win.**

 **I hope you all spend time with people that you love and cherish, and I hope you never hold back to show this.**

 **Arohanui and Kia Kaha x**


	4. Chapter 4

Clary had a cigarette between her lips as she kicked her feet up on the couch. Her TV was turned on, _Hemlock Grove_ turned down low so it was just background noise as she picked up her sketch pad and a couple of pencils. She had the rough sketch she had drawn back when in her studio with Jace, and now she had to get it perfected. She glanced at the sketch she had drawn with Jace and then started working on her new one. It wasn't an overly complicated design, and in all honesty she would be able to just go off the sketch she had already done and just fill in the blanks if she was that kind of artist, but she was a perfectionist when it came to her art and when it came to the stories that she was tattooing on peoples skin, so she spent over an hour making sure it was exactly what she imagined he wanted.

Sometime around seven she ordered pizza, and the usual guy from her favourite parlour came up and they flirted a little. He was about her age, his name was Sam, and he was pretty cute, in a baby faced kind of way. He always brought her garlic bread for free and made not-so-subtle hints about how he would like to see for himself if she had any more tattoo's under her shirt. It was harmless and fun, and Clary always had a smile on her face after her left.

Simon text her before eight to say that he might have done a little bit of stalking online and he found a couple of videos that were shot at gigs for the _Downworlders_. Clary managed to restrain herself for all of three minutes—and one pizza slice—before she picked up her laptop and opened up Youtube. She searched for the user that Simon had messaged her and found the videos that he was talking about. None of them were particularly good quality, in sound or in visual, but they did the trick, and she could make out the band members and the songs they were doing. She found some of the related videos as well, and then there was one that was clearly filmed by a girl who was head over heels in love with the drummer.

With Jace.

It was completely understandable why, and it was hilarious listening to the drunk girl commentate as she zoomed in on Jace, the video shaking as she jumped up and down to the music.

 _Are you watching videos of them?_

Clary laughed at the text from Simon, not bothering to respond. Then another one came in, making her laugh again.

 _You don't even need to respond because I already know you are. Probably checking him out and imagining all sorts of dirty things, you perv._

She tossed her phone to the side and went back to watching the video. They were now playing a song that they had played the other night when they had been at their gig, albeit the quality was terrible because of the screaming and shouting from the rest of the crowd. But that was okay, because Clary could still make out those long, elegant fingers, wrapped around the drum sticks that she had been lucky to get a close up look at. Every now and then when he wasn't thrashing away at the drum set, he twirled the drum sticks around, fingers flicking, and Clary was hit with a wave of dirty thoughts all over again about the things those fingers could do to her.

She clicked the metal ball against her teeth and shifted her eyes on the screen. Raphael and Isabelle were bantering on stage between the next song and Clary's eyebrow raised at the way Raphael's eyes focused more on the girls cleavage than her face.

And this was the guy that Simon seemed interested in.

Raphael's hair wasn't the bright red colour that it was now, and when she looked at the date in the corner of the screen, she could see that it had been posted almost a year ago. It was black and floppy, falling over his face. Isabelle's hair wasn't shaved on one side, although she still had the streaks of colour. The video kept playing, it seemed as though the girl had been there for the whole concert it seemed, because the video was still going as the band was thanking everyone and saying goodnight. Jace looked gorgeous, and her eyes strayed over to the hoop in the corner of his lip, and the casual way that he tucked the drumsticks into his back pocket of his ripped skinny jeans.

As they were walking off the stage, Alec threw his arm around Jace's shoulder and the pair of them said something to each other, laughing. Clary watched the way the jeans tugged to his ass, and then her eyes moved over to where Raphael and Isabelle were walking out off the stage as well, behind Jace and Alec, Clary noticed the way that Raphael's hand had reached out and hooked a couple of fingers into the band of her jeans, fingers idly resting against her ass.

So obviously the two of them were together, at least at the time. She hoped that they weren't still together now, for Simon's sake, because it had been a while since her friend had gotten laid, and even longer by someone as hot and as experienced as Raphael looked.

Clary finished off almost the whole pizza—Kaelie and Magnus continually complained about how much she managed to eat and still keep her slim figure—and got up from the couch to put the rest of the pizza into a plastic container and then into the fridge. She curled back up on the couch for another few hours with her sketch book on her lap, _Hemlock Grove_ still playing in the background but she wasn't particularly interested in it. She only kept making her way through the series because she thought vampire guy was beautiful to look at. The werewolf guy was pretty good looking as well, in a ragged kind of way.

Clary lit up another cigarette, opening up the lounge window that lead out onto the fire escape. She really needed to open the windows more, especially when she was smoking, because there was always this lingering scent of cigarette smoke and weed in the apartment, mingled together with the incense she burned on a regular basis. Probably wasn't what her landlord wanted, but the guy never came around, so she figured she would deal with that problem when it occurred.

Besides, she _liked_ the smell of her apartment, and so did the rest of her friends. It was relaxing, and smelt like home, and when they were all gathered together at her place they were all generally smoking cigarettes or joints anyway.

It was almost midnight by the time she turned off her TV and made a half assed attempt to clean up her art things in the lounge. She shuffled her papers into a pile and put her pencils into the chipped cup that had Dave Franco's face printed on it—a present from Kaelie a couple of months ago. She looked around and made a face, making a mental note that she probably needed to give her lounge a proper clean this weekend and the carpet _definitely_ needed a vacuum before her eyes landed on the sketch book on top of her papers, still flipped open to her most recent page.

Jace's tattoo.

Which brought back all sorts of thoughts about Jace, and his toned torso, and his soft mouth, and _those fingers_.

It only took Clary a few minutes to strip out of her clothes and get her shower to the right temperature before stepping over the edge of the tub and walking down to the end where the shower was running. She got the simple things like washing her hair and shaving under her arms out of the way in the first part of her shower before letting her mind drift back to Jace. She had absolutely no problem with shamelessly imagining all the things she wanted him to do to her—it had been a month or so since she had had sex, but she had a good history to build on.

She lathered up her hands with her citrus-scented body wash, initially starting with actual washing before her hands starting wandering lower. One of her hands skimmed over her lower lips, her fingers light and teasing, not parting her folds, just running her index finger softly over her slit. She felt that spark in the pit of her stomach flare up and the red head instinctively spread her legs apart to give herself better access. The hand that wasn't between her legs went to one of her breasts, sliding over her slippery skin as she massaged the underside of her breast.

Clary played over her clit, feather light with the tip of her finger as the fire in her stomach grew and began spreading through her veins. She lifted her leg to balance it on the edge of the bath tub and unhooked the shower head—one of her favourite bathroom accessories. She tugged at her nipple while she angled the shower head between her legs, right over her clit.

Golden haired boys with long fingers skillfully spinning drumsticks danced behind her eyelids as she leaned her head back against the wall.

It didn't take long before she was dropping the shower head and it was bouncing off against the wall, and her legs were shaking as she came, slumping back against the wall as the shocks ran through her body.

 **I don't really have the energy for a paragraph thing sorry. I've been fucking spiraling for the past six weeks or so, although I guess I had my birthday? Which was okay?**

 **Um... _Nightmare_ by Halsey is a fucking anthem and I don't know how many times I've listened and cried to it in the past day and half it's been out.**

 **Hope you enjoyed the update.**


	5. Chapter 5

**Merp, I've kinda lost track of my updating schedule? *Throws updates and internet cookies***

"Come on, move your ass," Alec grunted, shifting in annoyance as Jace flirted with a couple of blonde girls. They hadn't even made it into the club yet and they had been here for almost half an hour. He had considered not even bringing Jace, because it was _always like this_ , but after he had mentioned that Clary was going to be there, he had insisted on coming. However, despite his enthusiasm to see the red head again, they were still stuck outside.

"Okay, well, maybe I'll see you around," Jace finally looked as though he was ready to head inside.

"Yeah, you should call me," the first blonde said, who was wearing a sparkling purple dress and looked the epitome of trashy, with her ass hanging out underneath the hem and purple eye shadow caked on her eyelids.

"Or you could call us both," suggested the second blonde, who was in a green dress which covered a little bit more than the first's did, but not by too much.

"That sounds like a plan," Jace smirked, sliding his phone into his back pocket and leaning forward to give them each a kiss on the cheek. Alec made an exasperated noise when Jace finally started moving toward the club again, and Jace just grinned, nudging him in the side with his elbow. "They said that they saw us performing here a few weeks ago."

"Oh great, so they're groupies?" Alec rolled his eyes and Jace just grinned. He contemplated asking Alec to wait, give him some time to smoke a cigarette, but he knew that Alec wanted to get inside and see this guy he was still saying _wasn't_ his boyfriend. The bouncer at the door recognized them, given they played at this club once or twice a month, and he grinned and let them in without paying. There was no live music tonight, and if there had been, Jace doubted they would be able to sing with the amount of smoke that was choking up the air in the club tonight. It was hot and even though the air conditioning was turned on, it was barely making a difference given how busy it was. "You know what's funny?" Alec said, his mouth close to Jace's ear so that he would be able to hear him over the music and shouting in the club.

"What?!" Jace asked, lifting his voice to be heard.

"Those girls think you're gonna call them," Alec smirked, the spinning lights catching the purple streaks that were through his ebony hair. He didn't have his usual heavy make up on tonight that he did when they were performing, but there was still something sparkling around his eyes that made the blue in them pop.

"Maybe I will," Jace shrugged, trying to act nonchalant, but his cousin knew him better than that. It had been _months_ since Jace had been with anyone, and even though he was probably the biggest flirt on the planet, Alec knew that it had been a long time since there had been any follow through with Jace's sultry smiles and sweet words. Jace followed after Alec, keeping close to his cousin as they wound their way toward the bar. The lights were so dim they barely broke through the haze of smoke that was hanging over the club. Jace loved this club, but he had no idea how they were still operating, given how many fire regulations they broke on a regular basis. Two guys were dancing together, tongues practically shoved down on anothers throats, the sweat on their bodies pretty much gluing them together. They edged around them and reached the bar, which was just as messy as the dance floor.

"Magnus!" Alec shouted, and Jace squinted, wondering how Alec had managed to find his lover in the throngs of people and the fog. But somehow, he had, because there was Magnus, wearing a black v-neck shirt, the 'v' in the shirt so deep that it almost reached his stomach. There was a smattering of chest hair showing and...Jace squinted, wondering if it was just the lights playing tricks with his eyes, because it looked as though there was glitter on the Indonesian's man chest as well.

"Alexander," Magnus purred out. Jace couldn't actually _hear_ Magnus' words, but he could make out what the other man said from the way his mouth moved, and then a second later, the pair of them were kissing. Jace grinned, not bothering to hide it. Alec hadn't always been comfortable with his sexuality, hiding the fact he was gay until they were about eighteen from everyone except for Jace, Isabelle and Raphael. Even now, he wasn't always so open about who he was dating, but Magnus seemed to draw him right out, which Jace was happy about. "Ooh, and Jace," Magnus finally pulled himself away from Alec, looking over the other mans shoulder and toward Jace. "The rest of us are over there," he jerked his head back. Jace followed his gaze but couldn't quite make out anyone he recognized. There were just shapes of people jumping, dancing and kissing. "Let's go," Magnus gripped Alec's hand, linking their fingers together, and leading the way.

And there she was.

Clary.

Shit, she was fucking beautiful.

The first time he had seen her, he knew that she was gorgeous, even though she wasn't the most outwardly prettiest girl he had ever seen. But there was just something about her, this aura that surrounded her that set her apart. There was something so fearless and free about her expression, her head tipped back as she wrapped her arms around a blonde girls shoulders. The blonde was the one from the tattoo parlor, she had worked at reception, and she was beautiful as well, but it was Clary that kept drawing Jace's eyes.

She was wearing a halter dress that showed off her arms and was completely backless, her tattoo's on full display, the leather cuffs and bracelets around her wrists sliding up her arms as she lifted them above her head, twisting her hips from side to side. There was a third dancer, a male, and he moved up to stand behind the blonde, the three of them all dancing together in sync. He had hair past his shoulders, and the tops of his ears were pierced with delicate, linked chains hanging from them, and he circled his arms around both the blonde and Clary. His fingers were touching the tattoo's on Clary's back and Jace desperately wanted to be the one doing that, tracing her tattoo's...Preferably with his tongue, but he would settle for his hands.

"Eye problem much?" Jace almost jumped at the voice in his ear, and Magnus' white teeth flashed as he smirked. "She's single, if you're wondering," Magnus offered. Clary laughed at something the long haired man said, nuzzling her face into the blonde's neck before she seemed to realize that there were eyes on them. She looked over in their direction, seeing Jace for the the first time, and her lips twisted into a smile. She poked out her tongue playfully, the spinning spot lights catching the silver ball from the piercing and the thought of that tongue and piercing on him sent a hot spike toward his groin.

"Come dance!" Clary shouted out, and even though they were only a couple of metres away, Jace could only just hear her. When he looked to his left, Magnus and Alec were backed up against the booth, Alec sitting on one of the bar stools, completely wrapped up in one another. He had a fleeting thought, hoping that Alec would actually make things official with Magnus, and then he was walking toward Clary. She spun away from the blonde and the man, throwing her arms around Jace's neck as though they were old friends. She smelt good, a little like sweat, a little like cigarette smoke, and then there was the flowery perfume that she was wearing that brought it all together. Clary leaned in, her lips brushing against his ear, and his face was close to her right shoulder, seeing the coloured ink lines covering her skin. "I was wondering when you would show up." Jace turned his head, not wanting to pull away, talking directly into his ear, his mouth close to the piercings that were up and down her ears.

"You knew that I was coming?" He asked.

"Magnus might have mentioned it," Clary pulled away from him and gave him a coy grin. She turned around, and for a moment, Jace wondered if she was going to dance away from him, go back and join her friends, but, no.

It was so much better.

She settled her ass into his lap, grinding down hard against him in an experienced way, and she reached one hand backwards, wrapping it around his neck, her finger nails raising goosebumps down his spine. He was only human; a beautiful girl was pressed up against him and moving in time to the thumping, heavy beat—he was most _definitely_ hard.

Jace managed to get his body to catch up with the present, resting both hands on her waist and holding her firmly against him. Clary turned her head half to the side, and there was a smile on her lips, which were painted a dark colour. Jace couldn't tear his eyes away from her face, at the way her eyelashes seemed to go on forever, and they were incredibly dark, framing her green eyes that shone so bright when the lights caught them. After a few more swipes of the lights spinning over them, Jace processed that the pupils of her eyes were dilated, and her body temperature was high—higher than it should be, even with the dancing and the crowded room.

"You on something?" He managed to get out, although he might have stuttered a little, especially when she ground her ass backwards, harder against his crotch than last time. His hands shifted forward, one of his hands splaying out over her stomach, inching downwards.

"Might have taken something that makes the lights a bit brighter," Clary sung out teasingly, pursing her lips together in a way that made him want to reach forward and taste her mouth. He could imagine that she would taste amazing—fuck, she _smelt_ and _felt_ amazing, of _course_ she would taste amazing. She was sweating slightly, beading at her hair line, and he wanted to lick at it, slide his hands under the slinky dress she was wearing and rip down the underwear that she was wearing.

"How many tattoo's do you have?" Jace wasn't too sure _why_ he was still trying to make conversation, because the music was so loud, and they kept getting bumped around by the crowd around them. Sometimes it was hard to even see Clary properly given how heavy the smoke in the club was, and that the only light was coming from the spinning spot lights.

"Maybe one day you can count them," Clary said, and he only heard parts of what she said, but he managed to make out the rest of her words from the way her lips moved.

"One day?" Jace asked, letting one of his hands slip down further, nearing her thighs, curving his body around her petite one, wanting _so bad_ to drag her off the dance floor and toward one of the dark alcoves at the edges.

"Yeah, one day," Clary smirked, slapping at his hands lightly that were getting too close to the hem of her skirt. "When you're not my client anymore." Jace tried not to let out a groan too loudly—although if it was in annoyance or in anticipation, he wasn't too sure—and just let her lead the way, grinding her body against his, filling his mind with a thousand fantasies that were definitely going to keep him company in the nights of the weeks to come.

 **So songs I recommend are _I Think I'm OKAY_ by MGK, Yungblud and Travis Baker, which I absolutely adore, and the song and especially the music video give me intense early 2000's feels, and _Lost_ by Dermont Kennedy, which is so damn beautiful, I've completely fallen in love with it. Also _Lost Without You_ by Freya Ridlings, which was sent to me by _Reppinda5o3_ and is completely heart breaking. Umm...I can't really think of many movies and TV series I've been watching lately. Sorry :( **

**Okay, so, questions; what's your lockscreen/homescreen/blah blah blah? My lockscreen is Dominic Harrison and my homescreen is Demi Lovato, both total babes.**

 **Umm...What are you go-to feel good movies? Mine are—not in any type of order— _Princess Bride, The Swan Princess, Stardust, Spirit_ and _Frozen_. Lol. Not even sorry. I think _Catch and Release_ might be working its way onto this list as well. **

**...' _Please tell me I'm your one and only/Or lie and say at least tonight/I've got a brand new cure for lonely/And if you give me what I want/Then I'll give you what you like_ '...**

 **xxxxxxx**


	6. Chapter 6

Clary had been working on the sketch on and off ever since Jace had come into the tattoo parlor. She had played with different parts of the New York skyline, and how to do the pocket watch frame, and she had two different versions of the tattoo to give to Jace, to see which one he wanted. The words, _carpe noctem_ , were easy enough to do, but she had scrawled them out in a couple of varying fonts for Jace to choose from. Jace made an appointment with Kaelie when he had come in last, and he was due to be in in half an hour. She'd finished up early with her last appointment, and so she had some time to kill. She was just heading outside with her cigarettes and a lighter when her phone vibrated.

 _So, I might have run into Raphael when I was going out for coffee._

Clary snorted as she looked down at the text from Simon. She propped a cigarette between her lips and lit up the end, putting the pack and the lighter down on the rickety, old picnic table that they had moved into the tiny courtyard out the pack and then tapped out a reply.

 _Did you tell him that you wanted his babies?_

She didn't have to wait long for a response.

 _I haven't quite got as far as discussing our future children, but we're going out to lunch now. I'll text you later._

Clary grinned, tucking her phone into her back pocket and sucked on her cigarette. Simon's sexuality was pretty fluid, similar to Clary's, although Clary definitely been with more guys than girls, while Simon's choices were quite even. She still wasn't sure if there was something going on between Raphael and Isabelle, given what she had seen in the videos, and even if they weren't a thing now, they still worked closely together, and things can rekindle easily. But if Simon was just after something casual, it didn't matter if there were some feelings between them, it could just be a fun fling.

Clary finished off her cigarette and snubbed it out in the glass cigarette tray on the picnic table, heading back into the tattoo parlor. Music was playing loudly in the reception area of the parlor, some screaming girl rock band that Kaelie got all wet for. Magnus was working intently on a tall man with a thick beard and a shaved head, the tattoo gun buzzing against the skin of his shoulder. Clary smiled at the intensity on his friends face before continuing past to her own room.

"Clary!" Came Kaelie's voice after Clary had washing her hands and was drying them on a towel. "Your next appointment's here!" She appeared in the doorway, wiggling her pierced eyebrows and then sticking out her tongue and making a lewd movement. "You want me to bring him in...Turn the music up loud so we don't hear you riding him?" Clary pulled the fingers at her friend and Kaelie snorted. She disappeared again, and then Jace came through the door a few moments later.

"Hey," Jace greeted her with a half smile.

"Hey," Clary flashed him a smile and nodded at the papers that she had in a pile on the small desk against a wall. "So I did a couple of sketches, just sort of adapting what you already wanted. Find one and let me know which one you like, or if you don't like any of them and want me to make some changes." Jace nodded and picked up three of the loose-leaf paper and flicked through them. She had done multiple sketches, all with little differences, the pocket watch shaped slightly differently from sketch to sketch.

"This one," Jace pointed at one of the pictures, which was done at an angle the featured the Brooklyn bridge.

"You sure? There's nothing different that you want me to do with the picture? You don't want me to make any changes?" Clary asked as she pulled out two white, disposable gloves from the box beside the sink.

"No, it's great. And this one," Jace gestured at the calligraphy of the words, ' _carpe noctem_ ', choosing one of the last options on the piece of paper. Clary nodded as she gestured for him to sit down on the seat in the middle of the room. It was already in an upright position, given the tattoo for the last client had been on the back of the clients shoulder. Jace took a seat, and whipped off the shirt he was wearing, letting it rest on his lap. Clary blinked as she was now presented with Jace's bare torso, the tattoo's all over his skin, telling different stories of his life, and then the piercing through one of his nipples. She blinked again, swallowing hard and trying to clear her mind of any unprofessional thoughts that were threatening to rise.

"Okay, so I'm assuming you know how all of this works?" She began as she moved to stand in front of him . "I need to clean down the area that you want me to work with, and then shave it for any hairs. Then I'll make a copy of the design that you want, print it onto some thermal paper and then we'll get it transferred to your skin. After you're happy with where the design is, then we can start on the actual tattooing. Do you have any questions?"

"Nope," Jace shook his head, looking completely relaxed in the chair in front of her. That was good, it just made matters worse when they were tense. She absolutely loved being the first one to make a mark on a persons skin, it was like being able to be a part of something that was always going to live on with them, but it was always good working with someone who was experienced with tattoos and knew what to expect.

"So where do you want me to do this?" Clary stood in front of Jace, tilting her head to the side as she looked him over. She could make herself turn into a professional when she was officially working—she had tattooed a hundred attractive guys and girls, in a hundred different places—and she was able to separate her feelings from her work. However that didn't mean that she didn't get turned on at times, when she was working on a client. It was a thrill that ran through her skin as the machine buzzed under her fingers and she saw the ink sink into someone's skin, slowly putting together a story that would stay with them forever.

"The words, I wanted them here," Jace turned his arm outwards and one of his long fingers pointed to the soft flesh of his inner arm. Clary nodded as she straddled the stool next to Jace, taking his hand in hers and stretching out her arm so she could look properly where he wanted the tattoo. He was pointing to an empty space of skin, next to some musical notes that were curling up and around his forearm, and what looked like a licence plate.

"And the other one?" Clary asked.

"Uh, behind my shoulder, next to the butterfly," Jace replied and Clary nodded again as she got up and moved around to stand behind him, her fingers pressing against his shoulder. She hummed under her breath as she backed away from him, toward her station against the wall.

"Do you want to have music playing?" She asked.

"Yeah," Jace agreed.

"Any preferences?" She continued as she picked up her iPod, which was plugged into an aux cord that was connected to speakers.

"Just whatever," Jace continued as he wiggled around in the seat, making himself comfortable. Clary found one of her playlists, turning the volume on the speakers down to a low volume, since she had been in here by herself just before and had the music turned up loud. She worked quickly and efficiently, making a stencil of the first tattoo, planning on taking them one at a time. When she came back over to Jace, he seemed completely prepared for her, holding out his arm in the same position she had moved it to, and after looking up at him from under her eyelashes a couple of times to judge exactly where he wanted the tattoo, she moistened the skin with some water and pressed the stencil against his skin.

"Okay," she murmured, more to herself as she made sure the stencil was pressed firmly against his skin, and then pulled it away once it was transferred. The outline was in bluish colouring, and Clary looked up at Jace. "Is that where you want it?"

"Yup," Jace nodded.

"Are you sure?" Clary pushed, because she always confirmed twice, given sometimes clients would just agree with her because they didn't want to be too much of a hassle. But Jace just raised an eyebrow at her before nodding again. "Alright," Clary turned away from Jace and going back to her bench, taking off the bracelets that were on both of her wrists. She had so many that it took her almost half a minute to take them all off, clattering against the metal top of the bench top.

"You wear a lot of those," Jace commented idly. "Doesn't it make more sense to keep them off through the day, than just take them off and put the back on again?" Clary paused, pressing her lips together as she stared down at her wrists, and then shrugged.

"Doesn't bother me," she replied as she finished taking off the bracelets from both arms, pulling on the gloves and then turning back around to face Jace. The whole area where Jace was sitting had been sterilized before he had sat down, put she still picked up antiseptic and sprayed down her area before sitting down on the stool and making sure Jace had his arm resting comfortably on the cushioned arm rest. "You alright like this? You comfortable?" Jace nodded his head and Clary gave him a flash of a smile before picking up her tattooing machine, already filled with ink and ready.

The machine vibrated in her hand as Clary began tracing the stencil that she had pressed against his skin. The tattoo itself didn't take very long, given it was only a small one, the pocket watch with the outline would take longer, given how much shading would need to go into it. It took almost twenty-five minutes, with Clary pausing every few minutes wipe away excess ink with a paper towel and refill her needle a couple of times. Jace watched her intently, each time she would wipe away the ink she would catch him looking at her, but once she began working again, she could no longer feel his eyes on the top of her head.

After she finished the first tattoo, she spread some cream over the tattoo and wrapped it, not bothering to go through the after care instructions just yet, given she still had one to go. She asked Jace if he needed a break between the tattoo's, if he wanted to go out for a cigarette, but he said he was fine. Clary cleaned down the area again, taking off her gloves as she worked on the next stencil.

She was glad when Jace was quiet, not wanting to talk, because she liked to be in her own head when she was working. Some of her clients liked to talk, and she would oblige, because their comfort came before anything else, but she worked better when she could just focus on her work, and the music was the only noise going on.

Clary pressed on the tattoo into Jace's shoulder where he pointed, and then lead him over to a long mirror than hung, almost from ceiling to floor, and Jace looked at the reflection, peering at where she had pressed the tattoo. The few minutes away from the seat in the middle of the room and the stool where she usually sat, were enough to pull Clary out of her 'working' mindset, even if it was just for a few minutes. She let her eyes drift down, over his toned back and the rippling muscles, taking in the twining black ink. When she lifted her eyes back to Jace's face, he was smirking at her in the mirror, clearing knowing exactly what she was doing. Clary didn't even bother to try and hide it, smirking back before waving her hand at the blueish-purple stencil outline.

"This good?" She asked.

"Perfect," Jace was still smirking at her Clary. The red head only just managed to restrain herself from rolling her eyes. They both settled back down in the middle of the room, and then Clary got to work. Almost another hour passed, Jace's skin hot under her fingertips, and then she finished with the second tattoo.

"Go check it out," Clary told him, holding off on covering the tattoo, so that he could go and look in the mirror. She went over to the sink, taking off her gloves and throwing them in the trash, pulling on her bracelets after she dried her hands. "Okay, so, I'm assuming you know about the cream and aftercare?" She asked as she turned back around to face Jace. "Kaelie will go through it with you anyway, on your way out."

"Yeah, uh," Jace picked up his shirt from where it was slung over the back of the chair. "Look, I was wondering if you wanted to go out for dinner or something?" Clary's eyebrows lifted.

"Oh, really?" She let out a snort and shook her head as she moved to stand behind him, quickly taking care of the tattoo and covering it with a loose gauze.

"Really," Jace nodded as he pulled his shirt on and turned back around to face her. "You said when I'm not your client. And, well, I'm not your client anymore."

"I never said I would go out on a date with you when you weren't my client anymore," Clary reminded him with pursed lips. Jace looked a little uncertain, although he kept that cocky smile on his beautiful mouth, the studs on one side of his lip and the ring on the other side glinting in the light from above. "Look, I'm not big on the whole dinner date thing. But if you've got a gig coming up, I can come."

"Great," Jace picked up his phone and handed it over to her. "Put in your number. I'll send you the details." Clary took in from him, and added her number, passing it back to him before stepping away and waving at the door.

"I'll see you later," she told him pointedly, keeping her smile hidden until after he had sauntered out of the room.

 **Alright! Another mass update! I'm just...In a super shitty place right now, completely mental, my life is actually in a really good space—isn't it great when that happens? But writing is generally therapeutic so...Here we go.**

 **Movies I would recommend would be _Where The Heart Is_ , which is an old time favourite for me, and _How To Be Single_ , which I actually quite like, even though I don't like Dakota Johnson. It's like my love for Leslie Mann cancels that out though. Haha. I don't know...Both of these movies make me really sad and happy at the same time, so it's good.**

 **Songs that I've recently fallen in love with are _Perfectly Wrong_ by Shawn Mendes, _Chateau_ by Angus & Julia Stone, _You Make It Easy_ by Jason Aldean and _Marry Me_ by Thomas Rhett. Recommend any songs that you guys have had on repeat recently :)**

 **Hope you're all doing well, and please leave a review and let me know what you thought of the chapter because I love your comments x**


	7. Chapter 7

**Okay, this is gonna be another one of these months you get two updates in month, so...*throws internet cookies***

"Hey, Mags?" Clary shrugged a cropped leather jacket on and flipped her red hair out over the collar from where it had tucked itself underneath the jacket. She walked out of her little room and glanced into the next one over, Magnus' own room where he currently had a girl on the seat in the middle of the room. "I don't have any more appointments until just after two, so I'm heading out for lunch with mum."

"Yeah, sure thing," Magnus took the needle away from the girls skin and flashed a smile in Clary's direction. "Say hi to Jocie for me."

"I will," Clary gave him a quick wave before turning to the entrance-way of the studio. "Any other bookings I need to be aware of?" She asked Kaelie as she stopped by the reception desk where the blonde was sitting, her feet propped up on the desk in front of her, the short dress that she was wearing hiking dangerously up her thighs.

"Nah, doll," Kaelie shook her head and popped her chewing gum. "Make sure you say hi to Jocelyn from me as well."

"Will do," Clary flashed a smile as she left the shop. She paused outside, giving herself a moment to take in a deep breath of fresh air, before promptly polluting it by putting a cigarette in the corner of her mouth and lighting it up. The cafe where she was meeting her mother was only about three blocks away, and it was just _awesome_ the way that New York worked like that. So many things being so close together. While a lot of things were spread out and could take a long time to get to, this part of Brooklyn just felt a little bit different, and it was like walking into completely different parts of the city from one block to the next. The block where their tattoo parlour had a variety of different stores, including an independent art gallery, a cutesy jewelry store and a hipster-ish clothing store. And then just a few short blocks away, there was the mixed arts school that Jocelyn Morgenstern and Luke Garroway owned and ran, and there was a library opposite their school, along with a basketball court surrounded by a rickety fence.

It only took Clary fifteen minutes to cover the three blocks, and when she stepped into the little cafe where her and Jocelyn met every couple of weeks for lunch, she immediately spotted a shock of red hair at the back of the cafe, and after stopping by the counter to order a hazelnut coffee before heading down to the table where her mother was.

"Baby," Jocelyn greeted her, getting up from her seated position to give Clary a tight hug before both woman sat down, on opposite sides of the table. "Did you order lunch?" She asked, nodding to the counter.

"No, just a coffee," Clary replied. "I'm not that hungry, I think I'll just grab something from the cabinet before I leave." Jocelyn nodded, leaning back in her seat and proceeding to talk about one of her newest students, who apparently only ever wanted to paint in the colour black. While Jocelyn respected and valued her students individuality, she had been trying to get him to open up, experiment with some different colours, but apparently he was resolute in _only_ using black. Once their coffee came over and Jocelyn's food was brought out to their table, the two women fell quiet for a few minutes. Jocelyn's eyes flickered over Clary's fingers, which were stained with ink and the paint stains and then back to her daughters face.

"Are you still going to see your therapist?" She asked softly. Clary pursed her lips together and looked over her mothers shoulder, focusing on something in the background. "I'm taking your silence as a ' _no_ '," she commented as she cut off a corner of her quiche and obviously tried to pick out her words carefully. "You're an adult, I'm not going to tell you what to do," Jocelyn put down her knife and reached over to touch her daughters hand. "But if you feel yourself sliding backwards, promise me you'll talk to someone."

"I will, mum," Clary felt her chest constrict a little at the concern on her mothers face, and she itched to do something with her hands to distract herself, like pull out a cigarette and puff away. "I'm doing fine, you know I am." Jocelyn nodded, taking back her hand as she continued eating. "So...We're going to Coney Island, you know, on that day," Clary swallowed hard at the mention of the anniversary that was quickly approaching.

"And then you'll be coming back for dinner," Jocelyn didn't phrase it as a question, but that was because every day of the anniversary, Clary, Magnus and Simon would be at Jocelyn and Luke's apartment for dinner.

"You know we will," Clary gave her mother a tight smile, and it was just the discussion of the anniversary that had her crossing one over her chest, her thumb rubbing gently at the tattoo on the inner side of her upper arm. It was the exact same tattoo that both Magnus and Simon had, although Magnus' was on the back of his neck and Simon's was on the outward curve of his bicep. She traced her finger around in a circle, rubbing over the ink, before taking in a breath. "It's getting easier, mum," she said quietly, not looking at her mother as she spoke. "I mean...I miss him everyday, but..." she didn't really know how to put what she felt into words, but at least she could mention her brother in conversation now, which was something that she hadn't been able to do for years.

"I know," Jocelyn said, knowing exactly what Clary had meant, pushing her empty plate to the side, a soft, sad expression on her face, but she didn't look as upset as she used to. It wasn't just Clary who had been in therapy for years, and it had helped both of them come a long way.

"I think that he'd be proud of how far we've all come," the daughter said.

"I think he would to," Jocelyn reassured her gently and Clary's smile wasn't as tight as it had been a few moments ago. Clary licked her lips and drew in another breath, leaning back in her seat and fiddling with the bracelets around one of her wrists. "So how is Simon doing? I haven't heard from him in a while. When I saw Magnus the other day, he mentioned that there might be someone special in his life?"

"You and Magnus gossip like old woman," Clary rolled her eyes and let out a short laugh.

"Well, someone's got to keep me up to date," Jocelyn smiled.

"There's this guy that Si seems to have a thing for," Clary elaborated. "He's in this band—actually, I swear that whole band is fucking hot." This time Jocelyn laughed. "I don't know, they've been texting and stuff, but it sort of seems to be like maybe he has a thing with one of his other band mates? I don't know," she shrugged.

"You think he might be leading Si on?" Jocelyn frowned.

"I don't know," Clary shrugged again. "I haven't actually seen them together properly, but Simon is usually pretty good at judging situations. Maybe he had a thing with his band mate before and it's all over now. But, other than that, he's doing well. He's just been promoted at work, so next time we go out, drinks are on him."

"You drink too much," Jocelyn commented off-handedly, although there wasn't any judgement in her words, because she knew that it wouldn't do any good, and she had long ago accepted that Clary was going to make her own decisions. "Good on him, make sure you tell him congratulations from me and Luke, although I'll say it myself when we see him in a few weeks time."

"I will," Clary nodded.

"Did I tell you that Jessamine was pregnant?" Jocelyn questioned and Clary crinkled her nose.

"Someone could actually stand to be around her long enough to get her knocked up?" Clary snorted and Jocelyn attempted to give her a reprimanding look, but there was a twinkle in her eye that betrayed her. Jessamine Lovelace was well known for her snobby attitude to pretty much _everyone_ except, surprisingly, toward her students. She was an incredibly good piano player, and she taught to the beginning students.

"So she won't be with us for much longer," Jocelyn continued. "She's looking at moving across the city to be near her mother, so that she can help with the baby."

"What—has the guy split?" Clary asked with a curl of her upper lip. "Not like I _like_ the girl or anything, but she doesn't deserve to get ditched after getting pregnant."

"I don't know," Jocelyn lifted a shoulder and then let it fall. "She seemed upset when she was telling me, I don't think this is where she in envisaged her life, so I didn't want to ask her too many questions. All I know is that in a few months we're going to be out a piano teacher, so now I need to look for another one."

"Eesh," Clary sympathized, knowing how much Jocelyn hated searching for a new employee. She got attached to the people that she worked with—even Jessamine, who most of the other teachers didn't get along with. And then there was also the whole drama that came with breaking in a new employee, getting them caught up with all of the students and blending in with the rest of the staff.

They talked about Jocelyn's work, and then about Magnus, and then about a student that Luke had been teaching guitar for the past year. The boy sounded talented, but his parents didn't have much money, and while they wanted him to learn, they couldn't afford to keep up his lessons. Clary knew that her parents would make it work, they always tried their hardest to give their students the best opportunities, even if meant missing out on some of their income, giving the parents some leeway when it came to making payments.

"Ooh," Jocelyn made a face as she looked down at the time on the gold watch around her wrist, the watch that Luke had brought for her on their twentieth anniversary. "I better get back to work."

"Yeah, me too," Clary agreed as she got up. She didn't have another appointment for about forty-five minutes, but she needed to unwind after the conversation that she had with her mother—the first half of the conversation.

"I love you, babe," Jocelyn murmured as she reached out for her daughter, circling her arm around her and bringing her in for a tight hug.

"Love you too, mum," Clary's voice was muffled against her mothers shoulder. They walked out of the cafe together, and hugged once more while they were on the street, before going their separate ways. Clary took in a deep breath, walking slowly back to her work, one arm folded over her chest, with her thumb pressed against the inside of her upper arm. She rubbed it over the compass tattoo, brushing her finger softly over it, again and again.

It was the second tattoo that she had ever gotten, although it was the first one that actually meant something. It was almost an exact replica of a compass, all circles and intricate patterns. But there was a J where the N for north usually would be, bolder and bigger than the other initials. And there was a S where E for east would be, C where S for south would be and a M where W for west would be.

Jonathon, Simon, Clary and Magnus.

Clary drew in a deep breath through her nose, blinking away the tears that were itching at the corners of her eyes.

 **I watched the movie _It's Kind of a Funny Story_ for the first time, I've been meaning to watch it for years, but I just never had. I'm really glad I did, so I definitely recommend it. It's got Zach Galifianakis, Viola Davis and Emma Roberts and it's just a really really good. Sort of similar to _Perks of Being a Wallflower_ , although nowhere near as good since that's my favourite movie of all time. Haha. Also as I'm writing this, we're watching _Big Hero 6_ and I just adore this movie so much. They're all just amazing, and Tadashi is just...The most beautiful person in the world. Oh, and the other day I watched _Need For Speed_ again, which is just a mindlessly car racing movie, but I love Aaron Paul and Imogen Poots and so it's great. Haha.**

 **For TV shows, I've recently started _The Bold Type_ , and I'm completely in love, the three main girls are adorable, I don't know which one is my favourite so far. None? All? All, I think. And I absolutely love Alex. And Jacqueline is a fucking goddess. Honestly, the show just makes me so happy. Also _Crashing_ , which was fucking hilarious. Some of the lines in it were really cruel, actually, which kind of cut for a comedy show. I absolutely fucking LOVED Melody and Colin and Sam. Particularly Melody. Also, _Derry Girls_ , I've recommended it before, I'll do it again. Haha. My husband and I have watched it sooooooo many times, it's generally our go-to when stoned. Haha.**

 **Okay, so songs... Uh, some old ones I've been listening to— _Forever_ and _Sex Metal Barbie_ by In This Moment, um, also _Blood_ and _Adrenalize_. Slow _Fade_ by Ruth B, which is beautiful, _Cringe_ by Matt Maeson and the acoustic version is even better. _None Of My Business_ by Cher Lloyd and _Takeaway_ by The Chainsmokers and then _Hope For The Underrated Youth_ by Yungblud, which I bawled my eyes out over the first few times I listened to it.**

 **Okay; questions...Anyone into _Veronica Mars_? Anyone been into Veronica Mars since they were a child? Oh my god. I was so fucking disappointed by the reboot. Like, my entire heart dropped. I only got two episodes in, and I wasn't really enjoying it, I just felt like Veronica wasn't characterized well, she had actually regressed, and then I read the ending, and I just refused to go on. So...That's disappointment dating back to my primary school days.**

 **Umm...Favourite song right now? Mine is _hammer_ by nothing,nowhere.**

 **And how many tattoos do you have? I've just gotten my second one, and I think I'm getting a third in November, and then I've got plans for, like, four others.**

 **Anyway, drop a review, they make my day :)**


	8. Chapter 8

**Hey, guys! Just a quick heads up that I'm not sure if there will be two updates for every story next month, like there has been for the past couple months, we'll just see how it goes. Working a lot at the moment and my husband and I are doing renovations on our home and just general busy life stuff, so don't have a lot of free time right now x**

"Ooh, this has a very VIP access feel," Clary grinned as Magnus spoke with a bouncer who was standing by an _Employees Only_ door, and then they were let through.

"I don't think it's quite as glamorous as that," Magnus said with a shrug of his shoulder as they went down the narrow hallway that was lit by a couple of bare light bulbs hanging from the ceiling. Simon glanced up at them with a raised eyebrow and then met Clary's eye as they bumped shoulders.

"Not glamorous at all," he stated and Clary just grinned. She was wearing a tight green dress that was originally Kaelie's until she had stolen it from her wardrobe a few months ago. It was strapless, so the tattoo's on both of her arms—the water coloured flowers that were over her right shoulder and bicep; lilac's, gladilous' and daisies, and the simple black and shaded lines that were in the same place on her left shoulder and bicep; a large frangipani, a string of beads, a sparrow, several sea shells and a dragonfly, along with her compass tattoo—were all on complete display.

"In here," Magnus said, pushing open a door from where they could hear the strumming of a guitar. Simon went second and Clary followed last, looking around the poky room with curious eyes. The band all looked fierce and ready to go on stage, although she mainly had eyes for Jace, who was spinning one of the drumsticks around in his fingers.

Shit.

 _His fingers_.

This wasn't fair at all.

"Hey," Alec looked up with an adorable half smile, and Clary remembered when she first saw him on stage, and if he wasn't already taken by Magnus, she would be interested in seeing if he and Jace would be up for a threeway. Magnus leaned forward and gave him a quick kiss on the mouth that looked as though it was just meant to be a brush of lips, but Alec reached up and wrapped a hand around Magnus' neck and pulled him in for a deeper kiss. Clary smirked as the two seemed completely unaware that they were still in a room with other people, and she turned to Isabelle.

"I just want to put it out there, babe, that I fucking _love_ your hair," she said with a grin, and Isabelle's eyes lightened, as though she expected something else from the red head. "Like, I just would never be able to pull off the purple and blue streaks _and_ one side shaved, you are fucking gorgeous."

"Thanks," Isabelle tilted her head to the side with a grin. "Your tattoo's are killer."

"I designed them all myself, Magnus did most of them," Clary continued, glancing over to Magnus, who was still mauling Alec's face.

"Might get you to design a couple more for me, I've only got the one at the moment," Isabelle turned around, obviously having no problem at all with pulling up the tiny slip of a shirt that she was wearing to show the flower mural that was thick and full of colour at the base of her spine, and then stretched out toward both sides of her back and upwards toward her shoulder blades.

"Not that I'm _not_ totally enjoying this moment," Raphael began, smirking as he watched Clary reach out and trace the side of the tattoo on Isabelle's back with her finger. "But I'm pretty keen on some shots before we go on stage."

"Ooh, I'm always down for shots," Isabelle piped up.

"I was actually thinking I might do something a bit different to take the edge off," Jace grinned as he pulled an already rolled joint out of his pocket and held it up. His eyes zoned in on Clary, as though he was speaking just to her. "Wanna join me?" Clary nodded and he jerked his thumb over his shoulder, to where there was another door, at the back of the room, with a glowing Exit sign above it.

"Pretty sure that wasn't an open invitation," Magnus said under his breath, but Clary ignored him as she followed Jace over to the door, which lead into a back alley behind the club. As soon as the door swung closed, it was a lot quieter, the music from the club a lot more muted than she would have expected. There were a few dumpsters and it didn't smell the best, but Clary had had sex in worst places, so she didn't mind just standing and smoking there.

"Izzy's right. Your tattoo's are amazing," Jace said as he pulled a lighter out of his pocket and then put the joint in his mouth, lighting the end up. "I didn't realize how many you had," he said before falling quiet, sucking on the end of the joint. Clary glanced at her shoulders and arms, before shrugging and then holding out her hand for the joint. The bracelets on both of her wrists jangled as they clinked together.

"Yeah, just a couple," she smirked as she took the joint and pressed it between her lips. "I got my first one when I was fourteen, my brother pretended to be my legal guardian so that I could get it," there was a small smile on her face before she pursed her lips to let out a stream of smoke. "My mum flipped out when she saw it."

"My mother was the same," Jace noted. They passed the joint back and forth until it was burnt out and Jace gave her a cheeky smile as his eyes gave her petite body a once over. "A kiss for good luck?" Clary's eyebrows lifted and she couldn't help a short laugh before she shook her head.

"Maybe if you do well, you can come back to my place after," she told him and she saw the way Jace's pupils dilated.

"Is that a promise?" He asked as he stepped closer, and Clary took in a deep breath, breathing in the scent of the cigarette smoke and weed that was clinging to his clothes. It was the kind of smell she liked, especially mixed together with the cologne that he was wearing.

"If you're lucky," Clary smirked at him. She hesitated for a moment, and then leaned forward, bringing their lips together in a hard kiss. Jace was caught off guard, and it took him a moment before he responded, but then he returned the hungry motion, and Clary's body was pushed back hard against the door of the club. The handle was digging into her back, but she ignored it, because this was only going be a short interlude, despite the fact that his hand was heavy and promising on her hip, and the touch of the tip of his tongue to his lips made her sigh. "That's enough..." Clary managed to get her hands in between them and push him away just a short distance.

His lips were pursed and even in the shoddy lighting in the alley, she could see how pink they were, slightly damp, and _god_ , she wanted to kiss him again, but Jace had to get ready for his show, and Clary was pretty sure if she let this escalate, she wouldn't be able to stop herself from investigating those magic fingers further.

" _Later_ ," Clary told him, a twinkle in her eyes, her hands dropping back to her side with a jingle of her assortment of bracelets. Jace smirked at her, lifting his eyebrow and letting his eyes travel over her, his gaze heated, before nodding and reaching around behind her. He leaned in close, his body purposefully pressing up against her as he opened the door, giving her a teasing look as he held open his arm for her, gesturing that she go inside first.

* * *

Clary wasn't too sure where the time went, because one minute she was walking back down the dimly lit back halls of the club, then she was in the crowded club, jumping and banging her head to the music, then they were all around a table, and she was in Jace's lap. They were drinking, although Clary only had a couple, she was more interested in the joints that were being passed around, and it seemed as though Jace was as well.

Then they were heading back to her apartment.

"Seriously," Clary mumbled as she managed to get the door of her apartment open and then turned around to face Jace, reaching out to grab at his hands. "The first thing that I really noticed about you were your hands," her words came out a little slurred, and then she bumped into her sofa and almost fell over the back of it.

"Shit!" Jace let out a laugh as he wrapped an arm around her waist and steadied her. "You alright?"

"Yeah," Clary nodded, steadying herself and then balancing her hands on his shoulders as she kicked off the heels she was wearing, which she was pretty sure were also Kaelie's. Once she got out of them and was standing flat on the ground, the height difference between them was even more drastic, and she had to admit, she liked it. She was used to being shorter than the people she went home with, but along with the glinting of piercings on his face and his shaggy hair falling in front of his eyes, and the way that he was crowding her against the couch, it was sending fire all through her veins.

Jace stared down at her, and the only light in the room was coming from the lamp in the corner, and there were shadows falling over his face. Clary was a little drunk and a lot stoned, and the world was a bit hazy around the edges. She wasn't completely inebriated, she knew her limits, and she was still within them, she was just in a pleasantly buzzed state. It just made everything feel even better.

"You alright?" Jace asked again, towering over her, his breath smelling faintly of weed as it brushed over her lips and cheeks. Clary felt a shiver go down her spine, and Jace's lips quirked upwards in a smirk, the ring in the corner of his mouth twitching. She got that he was just checking in with her, and it was ever so chivalrous of him to be checking that she wasn't too drunk to consent, but she had been in this position a _many_ times before, and she knew what she was doing, and what she wanted.

"I'm good," Clary mumbled, reaching up to grip his shirt firmly in her hands and jerk him downwards. Their lips came together messily, their teeth clinking together as they found each others pace. Jace responded without hesitation, and his hands came down and rested on her ass, gripping it through the material of the thin dress. Clary pushed him backwards, and they fell clumsily onto the couch.

"Ouch," Jace mumbled, pulling away from Clary for a moment and digging around at something underneath him. He pulled out the remote for the TV, and Clary laughed, taking it from him and tossing it over her shoulder.

"As you can tell, I don't clean this place very often," Clary flicked her tongue out at him, and she watched the way his pupils dilated when they caught a glimpse of the silver piercing.

"Yes," Jace picked up something that was strewn over the back of the couch and held it up between them. It was a slip of neon green, lacy underwear. Clary took them from him and threw them in the same direction that the remote had gone before she focused back on Jace.

The kissing got even more heated, and Jace was uncomfortably hard in his jeans as Clary ground down on him. She was panting and gripping his shirt, pushing it upwards and scratching her long fingernails down his chest. Jace had thought that they were heading in the direction of both of them getting completely undressed, but as Clary shimmied her dress up around her waist and she rolled her hips against the zipper of his jeans, he realized that this was all actually going to finish while they were both dressed.

One hand was wrapped around her waist and the other pressed between her legs, not even bothering to push aside the slip of fabric and just rubbing her clit through her thong, feeling the dampness on his fingertips.

"Fuck," Jace growled, biting at Clary's neck and twisting his fingers in her hair. It had been a long time since he had come in his pants like a teenager, but there had been something about Clary that had been keeping him on edge all night, so it wasn't actually that difficult. She felt so good, writhing around on top of him and biting down on his lip, playing with the piercing in the corner of his mouth.

Clary hissed and bit down on his earlobe as she came, and then she wiggled backwards on his thighs and rubbed him through his jeans until he came as well, laughing and out of breath as she crumbled next to him.

 **Songs that I recommend are _Die A Little_ by Yungblud, _Teeth_ by 5SOS, _Love Myself_ by Olivia O'Brien and _Middle Finger_ by Bohnes, all of which have just been on repeat for the past week or so. Also, my husband is completely obsessed with _Motivation_ by Normani and _Slide Away_ by Miley Cyrus, so I've been hearing those a lot recently as well. Lol.**

 **I've been fighting this cold/flu/virus things for moooonths now, and I took a day off work coz it hit hard and I was feeling sorry for myself and I just spent it watching fluffy movies that make me happy. Haha. _Footloose_ , the original one, of course, even though I don't mind the new one. _A Cinderella Story, Ever After, Raise Your Voice, Centre Stage: Turn It Up, What A Girl Wants, The Prince & Me, 13 Going On 30 _and _High School Musical_ so those are my recommendations!**

 **Okay, so questions—how many of you guys are planning on getting Disney+? Haha. It's just been announced that it _will_ be getting released in New Zealand, which we were worried it wouldn't be because so many streaming services aren't. But it's gonna be here in November and me and my partner are _psyched_! Haha.**

 **Is everyone else heartbroken about the Sony/Marvel breakdown? Honestly, my heart goes out to Tom Holland the most, because he has done such an incredible job. There's always going to be a special place in my heart for the OG Spiderman, but there's just something about Tom's version, he was fucking amazing and had so much heart, and I'm just _so upset_ that there isn't going to be more of him in this verse. He seemed so heart broken at D23. Poor baby :(**

 **Last one! Anyone watch performances at the VMAs? I honestly kind of think the VMAs/Oscars/The Golden Globes yadda yadda yadda are pretty bullshit, pretty biased, so I don't pay too much attention to the nominations and the winners, but I live for the outfits and the, like, two or three performances from artists I like. Lizzo and Missy Elliott were fucking _amazing_ , and I screamed when Alyson Stoner came out on stage. Miley Cyrus' performance was totally heart breaking, so fucking good. And Halsey and Jonathan Van Ness were my stand out outfits! Oh also—Joe and Nick Jonas and Sophie Turner's reactions to Camila Cabello and Shawn Mendes not kissing in their set was fucking hilarious. Let's face it, I think anything involving Sophie is hilarious—did you guys see her pasta related Instagram story? Ahahahaha. She's amazing.**

 **Drop a review, let me know what you think, love you lots x**


	9. Chapter 9

**Hey, guys! Before getting into it, I want to recommend some of my favourite songs as of late... _Undrunk_ by Fletcher. _Dance Monkey_ by Tones and I. And then of course _Kill My Mind_ by the beautiful Louis Tomlinson and _Lights Up_ by the just as beautiful Harry Styles, although the _Lights Up_ music video was an experience and a half, especially while high. _Pretending_ and _Honest_ by Mali Koa are just beautiful. Then _Promise Me_ by Badflowers, which...Made my heart hurt when I heard the song, and then when I watched the video, I cried for the next hour. Yeah. I just wanted to share some happy things, since my note down the end isn't as happy, I guess. Anyway. On with the story x**

Clary woke up slowly, and obviously late in the morning, given the sun was shining brightly through the windows of her flat. She had thought ahead enough to close the curtains of the window just above her head, but given her open plan flat, sun was still streaming in from the windows her TV, at the corner. Her head was buzzing a little and her mouth felt dry, and she crinkled her nose as she licked her lips and attempted to swallow. She must have smoked a lot last night, although it didn't feel like she had much of a hangover, so at least she had that on her side.

"I wasn't sure how you liked your coffee," came a voice from the kitchen, and Clary slowly turned her head to look over. Past the couch and the tiny kitchen table with the mismatched chairs that was covered in clothes and magazines and art supplies was the golden haired drummer with the beautiful hands.

"Shit," Clary croaked. "Thought maybe I had just dreamed last night." Jace let out a laugh and then winced and Clary wondered idly just how much _he_ had had to drink last night, because as he got closer to her, he looked a little pale, although still absolutely gorgeous.

"A good dream, I hope," he said with a flirtatious edge to his voice. Clary just gave him a small smirk as she took the coffee from him. It was strong, stronger than she would usually take it, but it was still good. She took a long drink from the cup and let out a moan.

"This is good," she told him, patting the bed beside her. "You can stay," she said approvingly and Jace laughed again before crinkling his nose and pressing a thumb into his temple, closing his eyes. "I've got some stuff that'll help with your headache," she told him, reaching toward the chipped wooden bedside table and opening up the top drawer. There was a mess of make up, a couple of condoms, a few loose cigarettes and a little purple tube of hand lotion. And then there was what she was looking for, a small white cylinder. "Pop a couple of these and it'll be gone in half an hour or so," Clary told him as she popped off the lid of the prescription container.

"What is it?" Jace asked, but he didn't sound too worried as he held out his hand and she tipped two into his hand.

"Codeine," Clary answered as she put the lid back on and went back from sipping from her Wonder Woman mug. Jace nodded and tossed them back, washing them down with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles mug that Simon had brought when she had first moved into this apartment and he had said that he needed a special mug left here, just for him. That had lasted all of two days because Clary was terrible at dishes and if there was a clean mug, she was going to use it. They sat in quiet for a moment, and Clary felt a little twinge of regret at not cleaning up in the past few weeks as she saw a pair of lacy underwear hanging off the end of the bed, a few piles of clothes on the bedside table and also a chair in the corner, some tampons that had clearly fallen out of their box on the floor beside her bed and a plate with crumbs on it. Her bong was also on the floor, but at least she had cleaned it out just a few days ago, and the water was reasonably clear.

"So..." Jace began slowly with a purse of his lips.

"So," Clary lifted her eyebrows in response as she waited for him to take the lead. She lost track of how many one night stands she had had and how many arrangements she had come to with guys and girls over the years—when it came to actual boyfriends, girlfriends or relationships, _that_ was what she could count on one hand. One of the things that she had learnt was that it was generally a good idea to let them talk first, so that she knew where they stood, and then she could say her thing.

"Last night was fun," Jace continued after a few beats of silence past and he seemed to realize that Clary was waiting for him.

"It was," Clary agreed as she drank more from her mug. Jace licked his lips and shifted on the bed, tucking one of his legs up underneath his body. He looked a bit uncertain and Clary thought that maybe she should just get things straight from her side. "Okay, look," Clary began, taking in a deep breath through her nose as she reached out and put the half empty coffee cup on the bedside table and turning to look at Jace. "I think you're cool. I think you make amazing music, you're hot as hell, and it seems as though we're going to be seeing each other a whole lot more given our friends." Jace's lips quirked in a small smirk, but he didn't say anything. "I'm not looking for a relationship. I'm not looking for a boyfriend," she tilted her head to the side and glanced him up and down, not trying to mask the appreciative look. "I would, however, be down for some fucking among friends." He let out a laugh at that and shook his head.

"So we're friends now, are we?" He asked, a teasing lilt to his voice.

"Fucking among acquaintances can be just as fun," Clary teased right back, feeling more than comfortable with the to-and-fro.

"I can settle with friends," Jace said, the lower half of his face masked as he drank from his coffee mug. He must have started before her, because when he lowered his cup, it was completely emptied.

"Just one thing," Clary told him, and her voice was a bit sterner than before. "If anything changes, if anything gets more serious or _whatever_ else happens, we need to be honest, okay? Coz I've been in this situation before, and even if we're not down for the whole heart-to-heart conversation things, that's still something that needs to be brought up."

"I can do that," Jace nodded. He licked his lips slowly, and the rings in the corner of his lips shifted. "Now...Are we actually going to take our clothes off this time? Because..." he leaned in closer to her, and Clary felt a shiver run through her. "I've been fantasizing about all those tattoo's of yours...About getting to see all of them, and tasting them..."

"Yup," Clary's breath came out almost breathy as she dumped her mug on the bedside table and practically leapt on Jace. He let out a laugh as his empty mug fell onto the bed as Clary straddled him and smushed her lips down on his. " _Definitely_ need to get these clothes off," she stated, barely pulling her mouth away from his to get the words out. His breath tasted a bit stale, and Clary didn't doubt that hers was the same as well, given she hadn't brushed her teeth and had then gone straight to the bitter liquid, but she didn't care, because it just felt too good.

He was good at kissing, and that was a _good thing_ , because kissing had always been one of Clary's favourite things to do. Sex was good—sex was great, in fact, but there was just something about kissing that Clary fucking loved. Too often it was something that got skipped over in favour of the actual act of sex, and she was glad that it didn't seem to be something that Jace skimped on.

From the way that he was massaging her ass through her underwear, she could already feel herself getting wet. She could feel the metal from his rings against her lips and it just made her shiver, wondering if she would be able to feel them when he went down on her. That was definitely something that she was going to have to find out, whether it was today or some other time. His tongue flicked out, curling around hers, sucking on her lips, taking time to focus on the top one, and then the lower.

"Shit, Jace," Clary made an impatient huffing noise as she tried to grind herself against him, on his cock that was hard underneath the denim of his jeans. He didn't seem to have any problem with it, although he wasn't helping her out at all, seemingly completely satisfied with letting her writhe about on top of her, hands on her ass. "Come on, this isn't fair," she pulled away from him, almost glaring, not caring that she probably looked like a mess, with a swollen mouth and completely tangled red hair.

"Hey, you got off this way last night," Jace reasoned with a lazy smirk, looking up at her from where he was slumped on the couch.

"Yeah, and I was really hoping that today would be different!" She shot back.

"It will be," Jace shrugged, two of his fingers edging underneath one leg of her underwear, inching it toward the crease of her ass. Clary felt her pussy clench at the feeling of his rough fingers sliding over the smooth skin of her ass, and her pelvis jerked forward instinctively. Their lips came together again, and it got messy as Clary gave up on trying to wait for Jace to move along and rolled him, jerking off her underwear and the shirt she was wearing, and then impatiently pulling at the button and zipper of the jeans that he had been wearing last night, and must have put back on this morning. "Shit—never heard of patience?" Jace asked, although his voice came out breathy as she pulled his cock out from under his jeans, noting that he must have been hoping that their morning would take a turn like this when he had gotten dressed, because he hadn't bothered with underwear.

"It's not really a virtue I practice," Clary shrugged a shoulder as she pumped her hand up and down his cock, getting him fully hard in just a few strokes as she reached past him and grabbed a condom from the bedside table. She released Jace and ripped it open with fumbling fingers, putting the condom on in one smooth movement.

"Shit!" Jace gasped out as she gave his cock another squeeze before lifting herself up on his knees and lowering herself down over him. " _Fuck_ ," Jace's fingers dug into the skin of her hips, not doubting for a moment that he was going to be marking up her skin. He was still mostly clothed, other than his jeans opened up, but her tits were bouncing up and down in front of his face as she rode him.

"Fuck, fuck, _fuck_ ," Clary kept repeating in her raspy tone, and Jace didn't stop himself from lunging forward and sucking at her shoulder, at one of those water colour tattoo's on her right shoulder of all different sorts of flowers. "Fuck, fuck," Clary repeated, breathing hard as she tilted her head back. Jace started meeting her thrusts, letting go of Clary with one hand and coming up to twist her nipple. She let out a gasp and her movements faltered slightly. Jace smirked as he rolled them over, throwing Clary down on the bed and driving into her. " _Shit_!" Clary cried out at the change of angle, as Jace looped one arm beneath her thigh and pushed it upwards. She went with him, hooking her leg over his shoulder and groaning against his mouth as he drove into her over and over again.

"Come on, Clary," Jace whispered as he felt her pierced tongue flicking out over his lips, tracing around his mouth and over his teeth. It didn't take long before she came, and Jace came not long after, the pair of them flopping back on Clary's messy bed with satisfied expressions on their faces.

 **Alright, so, obviously I didn't update last month. My bad. I'm in a pretty shitty spot, to be honest, mentally and physically and I've just got a lot going on right now. I'm still dealing with the abrupt loss of a family member and the fall out of that on my family and recently my husband has had a colleague take his life, which has brought up a lot for him. We're going to be okay, we're dealing with things, but I just need to take a breath right now. When I am in front of my computer and I'm actually focused enough to write, I'm not sticking to the schedules that I had before and I'm just writing what I really feel like which unfortunately hasn't been these stories. So I'm just...Gonna take a step back for a bit.**

 **You guys are all beautiful, and I'll be back soon, I just need a bit of a breather to re-centre myself.**

 **Since updating last, it has been World Coming Out Day and World Mental Health Day and I just wanted to say to anyone dealing with mental health issues and anyone in the LGBTQ+ community, whether you are out and loud or still processing things internally, you are all beautiful and deserve love and kindness. Just because I'm going to be away for a little bit, doesn't mean I'm unreachable, feel free to message me on my socials or on here if anyone ever wants to just chat, even if it's just about movies or songs, we all need to look after ourselves first, and then one another.**

 **Much love xx**

 **Tumblr: SereneCalamity**  
 **Twitter: CalamitySerene**


	10. Chapter 10

**Hey, beauties :)**

They settled into somewhat of a routine. They didn't have a regular day or time that they met up, but it was at least once a week, sometimes more. It just depended on their schedules and what else they had on, but even when they had both ended up a bit too busy to meet up, there had been a heated phone conversation where Clary had her fingers between her legs, underneath the material of her underwear. Sometimes they would talk after they had fucked, laying back on Clary's bed and passing a joint between them, or sometimes they would just watch Netflix on her TV. Clary hadn't been to Jace's apartment, but she knew that he lived with Raphael, and it sounded as though their place was pretty small, which was why he preferred to come by to Clary's, and she was completely fine with that.

They almost always met up if Clary and her friends went to one Jace's gigs, because they usually ended up drunk and stoned after. Their groups of friends had molded together well, and there was some weird tension between Isabelle, Raphael and Simon that Clary didn't understand but wasn't going to ask about. Simon would talk to her when he was ready, and at the moment he didn't even seem to know what was happening, so there was no way he would be ready to talk about it.

Kaelie made it clear that she approved of what was going on between Clary and Jace, given the smirk on her face every time they were together, and Magnus had just purred into her ear that he had known that they would hit it off, and he was clearly very happy with his own love life at the moment. Alec was the more reserved one in the band, when they were all in a bar or a club together, he was the quietest one, but Magnus had said that things were completely different when they were in the bedroom.

"You look tired," Kaelie noted as she looked over the top of her magazine where she was sitting behind the counter of the tattoo parlor. She had her feet propped up on the counter next to the computer and a mess of nail polish that she used in her free time scattered next to her elbow. "Did you have a late night with lover boy last night?" She wiggled her eyebrows as she close her magazine and turned her attention toward Clary.

"Nah, unfortunately not," Clary shrugged as she slid her bag off her shoulder and let it dangle from her fingertips. "Just couldn't sleep." Kaelie's face changed absolutely instantly, becoming cautious.

"Are you alright?" She asked, taking her legs off the counter and turning in her seat so that she could look properly at Clary.

"Yeah, I'm fine," Clary said before carrying through to her room. Kaelie pursed her lips together, as though considering going after her, but she just leaned back in her seat and tapped her long fingers along the edge of her counter. Clary let out a long breath as she put her bag down on the counter in her room, looking around. Everything was clean and fresh, given she sterilized everything and wiped it all down before she went home each night so that it was all ready for her to start the beginning of the next day. She probably spent longer than she needed to, washing her hands in the sink, the bracelets that were around her wrists inching toward her elbows, sliding back and forward as she ran them under the hot water, but it was grounding.

Jace hadn't been over last night, but she had probably only gotten about two or three hours of solid sleep. She had probably chain-smoked her way through about a whole pack of cigarette's, although she wasn't totally certain because she had just been finding random ones that were sprawled throughout her apartment. She'd also smoked a bong, hoping that it would help her get to sleep, but that hadn't helped, so she had just ended up streaming some old episodes of _SVU_. It wasn't often that she had difficulty sleeping, most things she was good at compartmentalizing things, but this time of year always got to her.

"Hey," Kaelie appeared in the doorway, raising her eyebrow as she noticed Clary still standing at the sink. "Uh—your first appointment is here. Nancy? She's getting the thigh tattoo?" Clary nodded as she pulled paper towels from the dispenser and started drying her hands. Kaelie watched her for a few moments, flicking her tongue bar against her teeth, making a clicking noise.

"Kaelie?" Clary raised an eyebrow.

"Yeah?" Kaelie asked.

"I'm fine," she said. "You can send her in." Kaelie didn't look convinced but nodded once and turned around to head back to the main room of the store. Clary took in a deep breath, then forced herself to smile as her client walked in.

* * *

"Hey, girl," Jace greeted from the doorway, a small smile on his face as he watched her clean up.

"Hey," Clary smiled at him. She was feeling better, just like she always did when she was working. Magnus, Kaelie and herself had gone out for lunch rather than staying in, and they had stopped by her favourite cupcake store on her way back.

"I was thinking we could go grab dinner?" Jace said with a tilt of his head. "There's this place that does awesome burgers, and we could get a drink and then—" he was cut off as Clary stalked across the room, putting her hands on either side of his face and pressing her lips firmly against his. Jace wasted no time in kissing her back, lifting his hands to cover her own, his fingers slipping between hers. When they pulled apart, Jace's eyes were a lot more alert than they had been a moment ago, and he let out a throaty laugh. "Or we could just head back to your place and order in?"

"I think that sounds perfect," Clary grinned, her hands still on his face. Jace smiled, running his fingers gently over the top her arms, sliding down the top of her hands and then sliding down further. Clary tensed slightly when he reached the bracelets and Jace paused, dropping his hands to her hips. He had never seen her without the bracelets, even when they had showered together or fell asleep, but he didn't ask about them, which she was grateful for. He shifted his grip to her upper left arm and turned it slightly, to look at the tattoo on the inside.

"Magnus has the same tattoo," he noted with a purse of his lips. It was a tattoo of a compass, or something that _resembled_ a compass. It was a circle, a thicker line outside of a thin one, and a thin chain coming from the clasp at the top, with a couple of black butterflies around it. Just like with a normal compass, which had N, E, S, W marked at each side for North, South, East, West, this had four letters as well. The letter at the top, slightly larger than the others, was a J, then a C, M and S.

"So does Simon," Clary said off-handedly, gently tugging her arms away from Jace. She tried to make the movement the look casual, but Jace could tell it wasn't. He didn't push it though, because it wasn't any of his business. They fooled around, they talked about some of the shallow things in their lives, but they weren't a couple. It wasn't like they had discussed their hopes and dreams, fears and nightmares. They weren't at that point. Maybe they would be someday, but they weren't yet. "Let's get out of here," Clary said as she slipped her bag over her shoulder and held her keys in the other hand.

"Alright," Jace said with a grin as they walk out of her room. Kaelie had already left, but Magnus was still in his room. Clary called out goodbye to him, and locked the front door after they left. They had shut for the day, and Magnus would do the proper close down when he left, but she didn't want anyone walking in and surprising Magnus.

It didn't take long to get back to Clary's apartment, and when they were in the rattling lift, taking them up to her floor, Jace snaked a hand around her waist and pulled her in close to him and began nuzzling at her neck. Clary laughed and pushed at his chest, but then he dipped his mouth lower and his teeth brushed against her collarbone and the laugh died in her throat, her body going slightly limp. He sucked at the thin skin that stretched over her collarbone and Clary let out a little whimper, one of her legs beginning to hitch up, when the elevator came to a shaking halt and the door opened, and there was Clary's neighbour standing there.

"Oh—hi," Clary let out a smothered laugh as Raj Ablack stared at them, not looking particularly impressed. Jace had only seen him a couple of times and it looked like the guy was never very happy with _anything_. "Uh," Clary still looked like she was trying not to laugh as she grabbed Jace's hand. "I'll see you around!" She tugged on Jace's hand, and the pair of them fell out of the elevator, quickly making their way down to her apartment door. They both managed to keep themselves from laughing until they got inside, but they were both loud enough that Raj probably still heard them. "That guy really needs to get that stick out of his ass," Clary snorted.

"Have you ever seen him smile?" Jace grinned as he walked toward the couch, ignoring the clothes that were strewn across it, and then pulled open one of the drawers under the coffee table. There was an assortment of coloured pens and half scribbled on paper, a lighter and even a condom in the drawer, but Jace ignored them as he grabbed out the menus that Clary kept there for a couple of close by places that did delivery.

"Nope," Clary replied as she kicked off her shoes and came over to Jace. She watched him flick through the menus for about point two of a second before grabbing them from his hands and tossing them over her shoulder, raising her eyebrow pointedly.

"Dinner later?" Jace asked with a tilt of his head and cheeky smirk.

"Dinner later," Clary confirmed as she jumped up, her arms moving to link behind his neck as Jace caught her and their lips came together, quickly resuming the heated make out session that they had been enjoying in the elevator. A moment later, Jace's legs gave out from underneath him, and they fell back onto the messy couch.

 **So obviously it's been a while, and there's a lot of songs that I haven't recommended! I've just decided to log into that website thing that shows your top tracks, so these are my short term top ten. 1) _She_ \- Harry Styles. 2) _Radio_ \- Lana Del Rey. 3) _Living Proof_ \- Camila Cabello. 4) _Hazel_ \- Carlie Hanson. 5) _September Song_ \- JP Cooper. 6) _We Made It_ \- Louis Tomlinson. 7) _All My Friends_ \- AJ Mitchell. 8) _The Sound_ \- The 1975. 9) _Wrong Direction_ \- Hailee Steinfield. 10) _Dazed & Confused_ \- Ruel. Bonus song would be _You Should Be Sad_ by Halsey, which is fucking amazing, so far my second favourite of the released tracks from Manic.**

 **There's been a lot of amazing TV shows that have recently come out; _The Witcher/His Dark Materials/Watchmen/The Mandalorian_. These are all amazing, incredible acting, the sets and scenery and costume design is just A+. Also _Spinning Out_ was really good, I absolutely loved Mandy and Marcus. I love when there are strong side characters that I can fall in love with, and it had good story lines.**

 **I've also been to a couple of concerts that were great; Greta Van Fleet, Ruel, Shawn Mendes and Khlaid. All bloody brilliant.**

 **Now. I don't want to say much about how shit 2020 has been because we're only 14 days in and holy shit, I feel like there's a lot going on. A fucking lot. For me, what hits closest to home is Australia on fire. On the fifth of January our skies turned an apocalyptic orange because the winds changed and the smoke reached us here in New Zealand. I just want to say to everyone who is dealing with anything right now—it doesn't matter how big or small—I love you and you're not alone x**

 **Tumblr: SereneCalamity**  
 **Twitter: CalamitySerene**


	11. Chapter 11

**Hey, beauties :) Here's an update for the week.**

Clary woke up on Friday with a heavy heart and lead filling her stomach. She considered not even getting out of bed, but as she stared at the flaking paint on the ceiling, she knew that she had to. There was no point in her being alone and feeling sorry for herself. Besides, it would be selfish of herself to do that, because there were other people that needed her today as well.

She rolled out of bed, picking up the bracelets and watch from the bedside table, and pulled them on, shaking them out limply so that they fell comfortably around her wrists before walking slowly to the bathroom. There were a pair of briefs on the floor that obviously belonged to Jace, but she just kicked them toward the corner to join the pile of her own washing that she needed to get around to taking down the washing room on the ground floor, not paying them any attention. Clary glanced at her reflection in the mirror—the smudged eyeliner and eyeshadow that she had worn yesterday to work and a smear of dark coloured lipstick over her mouth—and cringed before opening up the cupboard behind the mirror.

There were a couple of half empty bottles of nail polish, her toothbrush and toothpaste, a lighter—she seemed to have those scattered around the whole house—a few condoms in shiny blue wrappers, her birth control pills, and then two white prescription bottles. Clary stared at the bottles, at the antidepressants that she had been getting prescribed for years now. She wasn't sure how long she stared at them for, but after a while, she took in a deep breath and pulled the bottles out, looking at them each. She noted that one of them had actually expired, and when she shook it, there were still some in there.

She counted that as a win.

There was a point in her life where she was taking those pills so quickly that there was never any chance of them expiring. Clary couldn't actually remember the last time she had needed to take a few of the pills, although she knew that sometimes she probably _should_ take them and chose not too, picking alternative methods to deal with the ache of loneliness that would occasionally settle over her.

Today was a day when she would give herself a pass, if she did decide to take one. But after staring at the bottles for a few moments, she swallowed hard and chose not to.

Clary took out her toothbrush and squeezed some toothpaste on it before shutting the cupboard door and running water over her toothbrush. She shoved it in her mouth, refusing to look at her reflection, because she knew that she looked like a mess. She knew that she wouldn't be working today, and so last night, her and Kaelie had gone to a bar just down the block from her apartment building. Kaelie was the only one going into their tattoo shop at all today, actually, but she would only be there to do walk in piercings and make appointments for the following days, so she had a few drinks with Clary as well. Not nearly as much as the redhead though, and Clary knew that she was going to be taking a couple codeine before she even _attempted_ to leave her apartment.

Possibly something stronger.

She should be alright if she smoked a bong before she left, that would help to settle the nausea in her stomach and the panic that she could already feel beginning to seep into her mind. It didn't happen often anymore, she managed to keep the anxiety and the depression at bay—she was a hell of a lot better at dealing with it than she was when she was sixteen.

"Fuck," Clary muttered under her breath as she felt the tears spring to her eyes, and the skin on her face felt tight, her nose beginning to itch—a sure sign that she was about to start crying. She sniffed and spat out the mouthful of spit and toothpaste, and held her hands under the running water. She splashed the water on her face, and if a few tears mixed together with the water, then no one would be the wiser. After washing her face to the point where the eyeliner from yesterdays make up was almost completely gone and then head out of her bathroom.

Simon and Magnus would undoubtedly be there to pick her up soon, and she knew that they wouldn't mind sharing a bong as well, something to help with the pain that they were going through. So she settled for walking toward the kitchenette and opening up the cupboard, looking for something to eat. There was half a loaf for bread in there, which was probably stale, and then half a tub of honey and an almost empty box of frosted flakes.

She settled on the frosted flakes, but only had banana milk because Jace actually added milk to his coffee rather than how she took it, plain black, and so she was going through milk a lot quicker than she usually did. It was something he teased her about quite often, actually, because she could order the sweetest, most sugared up coffee concoctions when she was at cafe's, but when she was home, she always went with black, only one sugar.

Magnus was the first to arrive, looking as good as he always did, although he was wearing even more make up, and even though Clary saw the corners of his eyes were bloodshot, she didn't mention it. Simon showed up next, and he looked the most put together out of the three of them, but that wasn't unusual. While Clary got dressed, Magnus packed the bong on the coffee table, while Simon attempted to clean up her apartment, making faces as he picked up her underwear and clothes off random places and tutted over half smoked cigarettes.

They smoked the bong, passing it around with Lana Del Rey playing quietly through the beat up speakers in the corner of the room. They sat there for about half an hour afterwards, and then Magnus had ushered Clary into the bathroom and done her make up, while she had sat on the closed seat of the toilet.

The rest of the day passed in a bit of a blur, sort of how this day of every year usually did. She got a few texts from friends, some of them people that she rarely stayed in contact with and only messaged her on birthdays and on this anniversary, but she didn't reply to any of them, except for Kaelie. She didn't feel bad about not replying, the people texting her knew how hard this day was for her, and they wouldn't hold it against her.

Simon, Magnus and Clary got to Coney Island just before midday, and the first thing that Simon insisted on doing was getting a massive hot dog. Clary managed a laugh that sounded real enough but didn't quite reach her eyes, and told him that he knew that wasn't a good idea, given last time he had done that, they had gone on the Cyclone half an hour later and then he had been nauseous for the rest of the day. But Simon was determined, and so while Magnus and Clary settled for getting a can of soda with plans to eat after they had been on a few rides, Simon lined up for a hot dog.

"He's gonna get sick," Magnus noted as they waited for Simon in the burning sun.

"Of _course_ he's gonna get sick," Clary agreed as she sucked her soda through the bright pink straw. She was wearing a pair of cut off denim shorts and an off the shoulder, dusky pink shirt that showed off the tattoo's up and down her arms and on her back, and she was glad that Magnus had reminded her to put on sunblock that morning, because it was going to be a hot afternoon.

Simon came back, and he looked incredibly proud of the massive hot dog that he needed to use two hands to hold. The other two just rolled their eyes as they began walking through the stalls. They played a couple of the games at the stalls, Clary winning a purple unicorn that she gave to Magnus with a kiss on his cheek. They talked about Jace, and Alec, and Isabelle and Raphael. They talked about how the tattoo parlor and about some of the recent call outs that Simon had gotten, given how idiotic some of his customers could be.

They _definitely_ did not talk about Jonathan and what this day was.

They rarely did.

They had done all the talking, when they were younger, and every now and then they would bring him up in conversation, but it would only be after they had smoked a couple of bowls or drunk enough alcohol to loosen their tongues and minds.

It was just after six that they got to Jocelyn and Luke's apartment, and they could smell the amazing food from the moment that they stepped out of the elevator. It was always the same food on this day of the year, and it was so good, every time—it was one of the only things that Jocelyn could actually cook, given she burnt most things. It was bolognese, with the sauce made from scratch, with home made garlic and herb bread, and dessert was lemon meringue pie. When they got to the door, Clary lifted her hand to the door knob, the smell of the garlic and onion hit her, and nostalgia washed over her, and she faltered.

"I'll go in first," Magnus said softly, giving Clary's shoulder a squeeze before he opened the door and stepped inside, calling out his hello's. There was some music playing and Simon went through the door next, tangling his fingers together with hers before giving her a bit of a tug. Clary followed after him and swallowed thickly.

Luke was in the lounge with a beer and Jocelyn was in the kitchen, and that was where Magnus went, talking loudly and trying to distract her. Simon let go of her hand and went into the kitchen as well. Clary held back, pursing her lips together before deciding to go into the lounge where Luke was. Her step-father looked up from where he was sitting and he gave her a wide smile.

"Hey, baby girl," he murmured.

"Hey, Luke," Clary smiled back, although it was a little forced. Luke glanced back at the TV, and then toward the mantle before looking back at her. He got up, picking up the remote and turning off the TV and walked over to her.

"I'm gonna go see if your mum needs any help with dinner," he told her, leaning in to kiss her temple before leaving her in the room alone. This happened most times she came here, giving her time alone in the lounge. Clary licked her lips, flicking out her tongue and playing with the piercing there before she walked over to the mantle. There were pictures there, of her when she was young, of her mother and Luke, and then the photo that was right in the middle, that was larger than the rest.

Her and Jonathan Morgenstern.

Her older brother.

Or, at least he _was_ her older brother.

She was now five years older than he was when he had...Gone.

Her twentieth birthday had been a hard time, when she was officially older than her older brother, just like how her nineteenth had been hard, when she was the same age as her _older_ brother.

Clary felt tears spring to her eyes, and she didn't care about the make up that she was wearing getting smudged or ruined as she lifted a finger to the photo of her and Jonathan. It was the last one taken of him when he was alive, and he was laughing with his arm around Clary while Clary was mid eye-roll. It was because he had been teasing her about a guy she liked and she was just trying to brush it off. She had hated that photo when she had first seen it, but she loved it now.

"I miss you, big brother," Clary murmured, tracing a finger down the glass and sniffing loudly.

 **1) _Wrong Direction_ \- Hailee Steinfield. 2) _Walls_ \- Louis Tomlinson. 3) _Alanis' Interlude_ \- Halsey and Alanis Morissette. 4) _See You Again_ \- Carrie Underwood. 5) _Brooklyn Baby_ \- Lana Del Rey. 6) _Blood_ \- In This Moment. 7) _Casual Sabotage_ \- Yungblud. 8) _She_ \- Harry Styles. 9) _Living Proof_ \- Camila Cabello. 10) _Monsters_ \- James Blunt.**

 **My husbands favourites change all the time, but he has said that today the ones he played the most are _Adore You_ by Harry Styles and _First Man_ by Camila Cabello. I think my playing of the HS2 album on repeat has gotten to him, and he wasn't too big of a fan of _First Man_ by Camila, probably because I played it so much when the song first came out, it always just made me so emotional. After her Grammy performance last night, though, he was an absolute wreck, and he said he played it all the way to work, so I think he's finally on board with that song!**

 **We had a _How To Train Your Dragon_ binge in the weekend, which was amazing, and I've just started a new showed called _Reprisal_ , which seems pretty good.**

 **Also keep in mind, I am sending you guys PM's in response to your reviews! Please don't think I'm ignoring you guys! I absolutely appreciate all your beautiful words and support, just currently the alerts are turned off for any PM's, which is incredibly frustrating, so you're just not getting alerted by them when I send one!**

 **Much love xx**


	12. Chapter 12

Jace hadn't seen Clary in a few days, and even though that wouldn't usually be unusual, the fact that it had been over the weekend _was_. He hadn't actually seen any of her close friends over the weekend, which was a bit strange, since they had had a gig. He had thought about asking his band mates—especially Alec, since he couldn't remember the last time Magnus had missed a show since things had gotten serious between them, but he hadn't. They'd had an amazing gig, and the four of them were on a high, and so Jace didn't want to ask questions that might throw off their vibe, and then after they got off the stage and started drinking, it honestly got pushed to the back of his mind. He vaguely noted that the group didn't feel quite as whole as it usually did, but then Raphael jumped on top of the bar and started singing at the top of his lungs and he got distracted.

But on Sunday, when he had come out of his hangover and after he and Alec had gone to a burger joint and drowned themselves in greasy food, he had sent off a text to Clary. He hadn't gotten a reply by the time he got back to his apartment, which didn't surprise him since she wasn't the best when it came to responding to texts, so he hadn't messaged her again until Monday morning, when he still hadn't heard from her.

It was now Tuesday afternoon and after Jace had finished working at the garage for the day, he had decided to drop by the tattoo parlor to see her. On his way out, one of the full time workers, Daniel Quinn, had said that he looked as though someone had kicked his puppy and Jace had pulled the fingers over his shoulder, but he had to admit that he knew he hadn't been particularly happy that day.

Jace told himself that it wasn't like he was checking up on her, since he had stopped by the parlor countless times before, but he knew that it was only partly that. He was a bit worried about her, and he also wondered if maybe he had done something wrong, even though he knew that with Clary's personality, she definitely would have called him out on it by now. When he got to the tattoo parlor, he was surprised that the front door was shut and there weren't the usual huge array of lights on. He paused and checked the time on his phone, but it was still before five, and the closed sign wasn't up, so he pushed open the door and stepped inside.

"Hey," Jace knew his voice sounded confused as he looked over to where Kaelie was sitting behind the desk.

"Hey," she smiled back at him, although he didn't miss the slightly cautious look in her eyes. Usually she would grin a bit wider and there would be a flirty edge to it, but it wasn't there today. "What's up?"

"Uh, I was wondering if Clary was here?" Jace asked as he came over to the desk. Kaelie's smile faded slightly and she tugged at the corner of her lips with her teeth and he heard a click of her tongue piercing flicking against the back of her teeth.

"She's not," Kaelie twisted her mouth. "Sorry." She _did_ look sorry.

"Is she sick?" Jace asked, his eyebrows pulling together. "Just, I text her over the weekend and I haven't heard anything..." He _definitely_ sounded as though he was checking up on her, and he was about to try and and rephrase his sentence, but Kaelie didn't look as though she was holding it against him, she actually looked sympathetic.

"She always takes time off around now," Kaelie said carefully. "So does Magnus. But they'll be back in a couple of days."

"Is she at home?" Jace asked, trying to figure out what was going on.

"Uh..." Kaelie trailed off again, looking torn. "I'm not sure. She could be? But I think it's best that you gave her some space, leave her be for a bit. She'll let you know when she's ready to talk again—and it won't be long, promise." He took in a deep breath and licked his lips quickly. Jace wanted to ask more questions, because it seemed unfairly cryptic that Kaelie had said _that_ much, but he didn't push it. Kaelie was best friends with Clary, and he wasn't going to put her in a position where she said something more than Clary would want.

"Okay," Jace nodded his head and forced a smile. "I'll see you around."

"Bye, Jace," Kaelie gave him another smile, although nowhere near as big as when he had first walked in. Jace took in a deep breath as he walked back out of the shop and stopped on the footpath. It was busy, to the point where Jace was getting jostled constantly by people bustling around him, but he didn't move for a good few minutes as he thought about what to do next. Then he turned in the opposite direction that he had come from and pulled his phone out of his pocket, tapping a few times before lifting his phone to his ear. It rang twice and then Alec's voice came down the line.

"What's up?" Alec asked.

"Have you talked to Magnus?" Jace asked, getting straight to the point. He grunted under his breath as he was slammed in the shoulder by a bolshy man in hi-vis and rolled his eyes before continuing to walk forward. "Like in the past couple of days?"

"Uh..." Alec sighed and Jace could hear him shifting around, maybe sitting down. "Yeah, I have."

"Have you seen him?" Jace continued as he stopped at the curb and waited for the 'walk now' signal to flash with a dozen other people.

"Yeah," Alec continued. "But only briefly. I text him on Friday morning and asked to see him that night, but he said he was busy with something with Clary and Simon. And then I asked him to come to gig on Saturday night, and he never replied. He called me last night, apologized, but he sounded weird—kind of quiet, you know?"

"Which completely isn't Magnus," Jace muttered as the lights changed and he began walking across the road.

"Exactly," Alec agreed. "He came over last night and we had dinner, but it was...It was weird. It just felt off." There was some more shuffling around and then Jace heard the gentle strum of an acoustic guitar. He was guessing that it was the one that Alec had owned since he was fourteen, and if Jace was right about that, then it meant that Alec was worried. He always reverted back to that guitar when things were heavy on his mind. "He was only here for a few hours, we watched a movie and then I tried to talk to him, but he just said he really wasn't up for talking."

"Which completely isn't Magnus," Jace repeated.

"Exactly," Alec parroted back.

"I'm gonna go over to Clary's. She hasn't replied to any of my texts and she's not at work. I went by and Kaelie was the only one there," Jace told Alec as he crossed another road, now only two blocks from Clary's place.

"Okay," Alec agreed. "Let me know if you find out anything." Jace ended the call and tucked his phone into pocket and continued walking. At least he knew that it wasn't something that he had done if it was affecting Clary. He wondered if he should try Isabelle or Raphael and ask them about Simon, but he was quickly close to Clary's apartment and he hoped that he would see her soon. His mind was a little messy as he got to her building and took the stairs up to her floor. Jace had been there so many times before that he knew the stairs that were creaky and he dodged around a few of them on his way up. He got to her door and lifted his hand and paused.

The apartment building wasn't particularly upscale—not like Jace lived in a great apartment either, but hers was definitely a little bit more run down. Which meant it wasn't unusual to be able to smell cigarette smoke and fast food and weed when walking down the hallway, coming from the different doors.

He could especially smell the weed coming through Clary's door, it was strong from where he was standing.

He could hear the sound of music coming from inside. It was a female singer, some blonde, indie chick, but he couldn't remember her last name. She listened to her quite a lot, especially when they were getting high. Jace didn't mind her music, in fact some of her stuff had a good, sultry beat that Clary had bobbed her head up and down to when she had been sucking Jace off.

"Clary?" Jace called out as he lifted his knuckles and rapped them against the door. He waited for a few moments, not hearing any movement from inside the apartment. He resisted the urge to put his ear to the door, although he stepped up so close that his nose was only a few inches away from the wood. He could still hear the music—in fact, it actually sounded like the music got turned up a little louder, although only by a little bit. He lifted his hand again and knocked, harder this time and longer. "Clary?!" He called out again.

Jace pulled his phone out of his pocket and scrolled through his contacts until he got to her name, pressing down on the screen and lifting his phone to his ear. He heard the ring tone start going off in the apartment before his phone started ringing and he listened as it rang and rang, the ring tone in the house playing loudly, the rock music a complete contrast to the music playing through the stereo, until it went to voice mail. She hadn't pressed end call and sent him straight to voice mail, so that was something.

Maybe she was asleep.

He could definitely smell weed, so maybe she had gotten high, been listening to music and fallen asleep.

Jace pursed his lips together as her voice mail played out in his ear, her voice singing out for him to leave a message, and he pulled the phone away and hovered his thumb over her name, thinking about calling a second time, but then he stopped.

He wasn't her boyfriend.

And it wasn't like they were great friends either.

They had mutual friends and they connected well together. They had fun, they got high, they had sex.

He had gone completely out of his way this afternoon because a girl hadn't been replying to his texts.

Jace shoved his phone back in his wallet and quickly walked away.

 **Okay, so my top songs this week are as follows;**

 **1) _Walls_ \- Louis Tomlinson. 2) _Alanis' Interlude_ \- Halsey and Alanis Morissette. 3) _Venice Bitch_ \- Lana Del Rey. 4) _Fake Love_ \- BTS. 5) _Too Young_ \- Louis Tomlinson. 6) _Always You_ \- Louis Tomlinson. 7) _Mikrokosmos_ \- BTS. 8) _Caught Up In Your Storm_ \- Mickey Guyton. 9) _8TEEN_ \- Khalid. 10) _Heebiejeebies_ \- Aminé and Kehlani.**

 **The song that my husband hasn't stopped playing is _Dionysus_ by BTS. We've been on a total BTS buzz lately, totally jumping on that train, even if we're a little late. My hubby's faves are Suga, Jungkook and Namjoon—he completely swoons everytime Suga comes on stage or starts rapping. Haha. Mine would be Namjoon, who I, admittedly, swoon over everytime he comes on screen, and then Jungkook, even if he's too pretty to even exist.**

 **In one of my reviews, _KnivesOut_ recomended _Anne With An E_ which I have actually watched before although I haven't finished yet, and I definitely want to recommend to you guys! I remember reading the books when I was younger and loving them, and there's just something about this series that has brought it all back. I've also started watching _Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood_ when me and my husband are high, and I'm super into it. Haha.**

 **I think my weekly updates are going to slow down a bit for a few weeks, although I think I had a good run! So I'll be doing previews of the next chapter if you leave a review and let me know if you want one or not.**

 **Also, feel free to hit me up on my socials;  
** **Tumblr: SereneCalamity  
** **Twitter: CalamitySerene**

 **xx**


	13. Chapter 13

**Hey :) So. This year has already felt as though it's lasted a century and we're only two and half months in. _Shiiiiiiiiit_. I hope you're all okay and have support and love and care surrounding you. I love you all.**

It was Friday before Jace heard from Clary.

He sent her a text on Tuesday evening after he left her place, telling her to text him when she was ready. He had wanted to send her another text the next day, when he didn't hear from her, but he stopped himself.

Wednesday night they had band practice, and Alec looked a bit better than how he had sounded the night before, so Jace was guessing that he had caught up with Magnus. Isabelle and Raphael were all lovey-dovey, which was enough to bring Alec down a little bit, so at least Jace wasn't the only one who looked as though he was bringing the party down. They were practicing a few new songs, and Isabelle was singing a lot more in this one that she usually did. Alec didn't mind, in fact he looked proud as Isabelle's vocal range was explored a lot more, but she kept getting the words wrong because she was staring at Raphael as his fingers worked their way over the guitar.

In the end, Alec called it a night, because he was done with the heart eyes Isabelle kept making at Raphael. Alec and Jace stayed behind at the garage a little longer, working on some of the newer stuff, and Jace liked smashing away at the drums and cymbals.

Thursday he spent working at the garage, and then he went out with a couple of the guys to a bar where he got almost to the drunk stage and played some pool and then stumbled home.

It was almost three in the afternoon on Friday with Clary text him. There was no apology or explanation about what had happened, just asked if he wanted to come over. When he had replied with a simple _yes_ , she had told him to bring the pizza and she would grab the beer on the way back from work. Jace had replied with _yes_ again and then had gone back to working on the BMW in front of him, feeling a bit better than he had before.

He detoured back to his place before going to Clary's, so it was just after six by the time he got there with pizza. He could hear music playing from inside, just like when he had come over on Tuesday, but this time it was something a lot louder and upbeat. He knocked once and then Clary was opening the door, and her eyes were a bit bloodshot, so he was guessing she had already smoked a joint.

"Hey," Jace smiled at her and Clary grinned up at him, looking as though there was absolutely nothing wrong and it was just another afternoon. She was wearing a pair of skinny jeans and a singlet with no bra underneath. It was loose and mostly see through, so that he could see the press of her nipple piercing in her right breast. Her tattoo's were all showing, up and down both arms and over her shoulders and he leaned forward and pressed his thumb gently against one of the daisies near her shoulder and ran it gently down to her elbow. "Missed you." Her grin faded into a smaller smile that made her eyes twinkle.

"Come in," she said, stepping back and opening the door wider. "Shit, that pizza smells amazing."

"Got pepperoni and chicken, your favourite," Jace said as he came in, screwing up his nose. "Seriously, it's a weird favourite."

"Don't judge," Clary grinned at him as she shut the door and then walked past him and into the kitchen. The place was a mess, as usual, but it seemed as though maybe she had made an effort to clean up a little, because there wasn't any actual rubbish or smoked cigarette butts lying around. Even her clothes were shoved under the couch or under her bed, which gave the illusion of the place being a _little_ tidier than usual. "So I got beer but I felt like something a bit harder, so I got some vodka as well."

"Whoa—jumping from beer to vodka, that's stepping things up a bit," Jace raised a pierced eyebrow and Clary just shrugged. Jace walked over to the corner of the apartment, where her TV was on but turned all the way down, any noise coming from it overpowered by the music coming from her speakers. He pushed aside a couple of half burnt out candles that were in misty glass holders and a few trashy magazines to make room for the pizza and Clary came over with the six pack of beer in one hand, a bottle of vodka tucked under the other arm and juice in that hand. She put everything down and then went back into the kitchen to grab a glass.

"It's been a long week," Clary muttered, referencing Jace's previous comment. He was going to push it, but then she was turning off her speaker and flipping open the cardboard lid of the pizza box and letting out a long moan. "Shit, this smells like fucking heaven," she growled before grabbed a piece and taking a massive bite out of it. Jace turned up the sound on the TV and recognized a couple of the people on the screen, looked like an old _CSI_ episode, and set about demolishing the pizza and throwing back three of the cans of beer. Clary poured herself nearly a whole glass of vodka and just a splash of juice and drank it reasonably quickly. Then she poured herself another one of the drinks, and Jace wondered why she was drinking hard liquor, but he didn't mention it. Afterwards, she stretched out on the couch, her head in Jace's lap and her feet hanging over the arm of the couch.

They watched three more episodes of _CSI_ , it seemed as though there was a omnibus of it on whatever channel Clary was tuned into, and then Jace asked if she wanted to watch a movie. He switched over to Netflix and found an action movie and turned it on. They were about half an hour into it, and he was nearly through with the six pack of beer when Clary twisted her body around so that her whole body was facing the TV rather than just turning her head. She began rubbing him through the jeans he was wearing and it wasn't long before he was hard.

Jace's eyelids began flickering shut as she rolled over onto her stomach, then pushed herself up onto her knees and set about opening up his jeans. Jace's hand went to her back, fingers curling into the material of her singlet as her fingers brushed over him intermittently as she undid the button and pulled down the zipper. Then she was pulling his cock out through the gap in the jeans and her mouth came down and enveloped him.

" _Fuck_!" Jace groaned out, tipping his head backward so that it was resting against the cushions of the couch. Clary's mouth was wet and cold—from the vodka that she had pulled out of the freezer—and it felt incredible against his warm flesh and his hips jerked off the couch to meet her mouth. Jace's hand got even tighter in her shirt so that it was pulled up and exposing the smooth skin of her lower back. Clary's mouth worked fast, the barbell resting on her tongue flicking over the head before pressing against the underside of his cock, sucking and licking and pushing her mouth all the way down so that he could feel it hit the back of her throat. " _Shit, Clary_!" Jace hissed through gritted teeth as he came and she swallowed around him.

He didn't give himself much time to recover before he was pushing her backwards so that she was laying on her back on the couch, head against the arm rest, and jerking down her jeans. He pulled them all the way off, throwing them to the ground along with the neon blue thong that she was wearing and then shuffled down on the couch, jerking her knees down so that she was closer to him. Jace's jeans were restrictive around his thighs and knees as he bent forward, but he ignored the uncomfortable feeling as he put his mouth over Clary.

She tasted sweet and musky and Jace's tongue worked her over quickly, similar to how she had blown him. He flicked his tongue over her clit, dipping down occasionally to her dripping hole, but mainly focusing on her clit. She groaned and rolled her hips against him and she gripped his hair with one hand. Jace let out a hum against her wet sex and felt his lips pull into a smirk at her responding whine. She thrust her hips upward against his face, chasing after her orgasm, and when it finally came, she hiccuped his name before slumping down into the couch.

Clary didn't bother covering up, laying back on the couch while Jace pulled his jeans back up properly, tucking himself back in and doing up the zip, although not the button. Jace cleared up their rubbish on the table and took his empty beer cans into the kitchen where the rubbish bin was as well. He left the vodka bottle and the juice, not sure if Clary was done with them. When he came back in to sit next to her, he pulled out her little wooden box where she kept her weed and paraphenalia. She had some bud left in there, and he set about getting it ready in the bong that had been on the ground beside the couch.

"Is everything all good?" Jace asked Clary, trying to keep his voice even, not too overly interested, not wanting to push too hard.

"Everything's great," Clary winked at him from where she was still lying on the couch and he huffed out a laugh. He packed the bowl and then fumbled around in his pocket for a lighter.

"I sort of meant other than right in this very moment," Jace replied as he played with the lighter in his hand. The bong was on the table and he rested his hand against it before looking back at Clary.

"I'm fine," Clary replied, although her words were a little firmer than before. Jace guessed that she knew what he was pressing at and so he gave up tiptoeing around the subject and turned his body to face her.

"Something's been going on," Jace said carefully, reaching out and resting his hand on her knee. "For the past week or so. I mean...I know we're not dating or anything, but it's still weird for you not to come to one of our gigs? And Magnus? Because he's _always_ there to see Alec. You weren't replying to my texts or calls or—"

"Jace," Clary said his name firmly, her eyes shutting down and bumping his hand off her knee. She got up from the couch, snatching up her jeans and underwear from the ground with one hand and then grabbing the bottle of vodka with the other. "I've got shit going on in my life that I don't want to talk to you about. I don't mean to sound like a bitch, but it's not shit I'm gonna tell you about—not now, maybe not ever. You're not my boyfriend, we barely know each other, and you're just not—I don't want to talk to you about it, okay?" She walked into the kitchen, put down the bottle of vodka and then pulled on her underwear. "I don't know," she muttered as she jerked on her jeans. "I just felt better today and thought it would be cool to have you over to chill and fuck and smoke some weed and whatever."

"We can do that—" Jace began.

"I think you better go, Jace," Clary's words were quiet but she meant them. Jace hadn't expected things to turn downhill so quickly and he got up from the couch, taking a few steps toward the kitchen.

"Clary..."

"I'm not—I'm not pissed at you," Clary told him, forcing herself to exhale slowly, and she made an effort to give him a small smile, but it didn't reach her eyes. "I just want to be alone, okay?" He couldn't argue with that, so he didn't. Jace turned back to grab his wallet from the table and then came over to where Clary was standing. He put his hands on her shoulders and leaned forward to kiss her lightly on the forehead.

"Call me, if you need to, okay?" Jace murmured and she jerked her head in a nod, before he turned and left.

 **I hope you guys enjoyed the update :)**

 **My top 10 songs for this week;**

 **1) _Kissing Other People_ \- Lennon Stella. 2) _No Time To Die_ \- Billie Eilish. 3) _Mikrokosmos_ \- BTS. 4) _Euphoria_ \- BTS. 5) _Is It Just Me?_ \- Emily Burns. 6) _Parents_ \- Yungblud. 7) _Cherry_ \- Lana Del Rey. 8) _In Case You Don't Live Forever_ \- Ben Platt. 9) _Hope Is A Dangerous Thing_ \- Lana Del Rey. 10) _Homesick_ \- Dua Lipa.**

 **I've only been watching old stuff recently, like _Criminal Minds_ and _Hawaii Five-O_...My husband has big plans tonight though, and has suggested that we get high and watch _Little Mermaid_ , so that sounds brilliant and like exactly what I need for the end of my week. If you guys have any suggestions for animated movies, send them my way, because we need all the good stuff we can get in the world right now! Ooh, if I can suggest a twitter thread, actually, there's one posted by a user _PAYOLETTER_ which is just...A feel good time about how so many people now have their pets as colleagues now that they're working from home. Making the best of a bad situation. The thread is filled with pictures of animals, if you need fluff, that's where to go!**

 **Love you all x**


	14. Chapter 14

**Hey beautiful people :)**

 **Okay. So. I wanted to say something about everything that is going on rather than just make a few vague comments in my posts. The situation now deserves more than that, I think. Because things are hectic right now. Things are just a smidge crazy, you know? Umm...I get awkward in tense situations and it usually results in me laughing at the wrong time or needing to go and throw up, because I throw up when I'm anxious, and let me tell you, I throw up on average three times a week generally, and that is now a daily thing, so that's super cool! Anyway.**

 **Just thought I'd add in here, my husband and I woke up the other Sunday morning, read the latest updates, and by ten in the morning we were drunk and high and had made the decision not to leave the house for the rest of the day because of how scary the world seemed, so I hope you guys are handling it just as adult-like.**

 **A lot of you know that I live in New Zealand. We're pretty secluded, we're pretty safe when it comes to most things. We are so _incredibly lucky_. Compared to most countries right now, we still are safe and secluded and lucky.**

 **Three weeks ago, we had no cases (at least, no one was being tested and it was not a concern at that stage). Then we had eight, then twelve, then twenty, then twenty-eight and as I'm writing this I think we're at one hundred and two, which is quite a jump for just a week and a half since we first started hearing about them.**

 **There was an announcement yesterday that from midnight tomorrow, our country is going into lockdown, as there has now officially been evidence of community transmission with two of the cases. So...My husband and I are nervous but we're okay. I will be working from home, likely also working overtime, as my job is essential, and a lot of my co-workers are actually still expected to go into the office, but because of my health I'll be at home with my husband and my cats.**

 **My husband will not be working, which means like a lot of people in the world right now, we're worried about meeting our financial obligations, but I would take those concerns over watching him get sick. He's been exposed to a couple of people who are reckless and stupid and have come back from overseas and not self-isolated, and one of those people are now being tested, so we have to wait for those results. One of our nieces was tested the other night, and we should have the results back by tomorrow evening. We don't have any children, but we have lots of nieces and nephews, and we have a lot of friends with children who have health issues, and we lot of elderly relatives as well, and they're all of our focus right now.**

 **All around the world, we're seeing these incredible gestures of humanity that _prove that people are good_. There's just so much shit going on, so many politicians who are trying to act as though they know everything and haven't made a single misstep (I'm not even going to pretend I'm not insinuating the horrendous lump that sits in the Oval Office), so many companies that are looking at making money off peoples suffering, and _so much uncertainty_ and fear and we just have to remember that a majority of people _are good_.**

 **Now, even with my country going into lock down, I just wanted to say that even though I'm expected to work, I'm still going to try and get up some small oneshots along with some hopefully quicker chapters, because I feel all _I_ can do in this crisis is possibly provide you guys with a few minutes of entertainment.**

 **I just wanted to give you guys a bit of an update as to where I'm sitting in this whole...Fucking disaster. Please, feel free to message me, if you want to talk about where you guys are at, or if you guys have some ideas for some of the quick oneshots that you want to see, or if you just want to talk music or movies, I mean, we all have to be there for each other, right?**

 **I love you all so much and I hope, hope, hope you and yours are all safe in this weird time,**

 **Me xx**

 **Tumblr: SereneCalamity  
** **Twitter: CalamitySerene**


	15. Chapter 15

**Hey, guys! I hope you're all safe! I hope you're all sane! I hope you're all blessed with brilliant house companions and high speed internet! I am trying to stay positive because the world is fucking scary, and on with the chapter!**

Jace had managed to keep his feelings all compartmentalized before, because he hadn't spoken with Clary. Over the last weekend, when he hadn't heard from Clary and she hadn't come to his gig, he hadn't thought too much about it. Because Clary was her own person and even though she almost never missed a gig and they almost always saw each other in the weekends, he knew that she had her own life, her own things that she needed to do. Given her friends hadn't been there as well, he just thought that they had something else on.

It hadn't been until Monday night, and then Tuesday afternoon when he had gone to her place and she had blatantly ignored him—he _knew_ that she was ignoring him now, and that she hadn't been asleep, he just knew it—that he knew that something was wrong.

He had wanted to text her a hundred times over after he had left on Tuesday, but he had managed to refrain.

He tried to take Kaelie's words to heart, to give her some space.

But then when she had asked him to come over on the Friday, he thought that she was going to tell him what had been going on, what was wrong. He had wanted her to be the one to bring it up, but then after they had sex, he had been the one to do it. Maybe it hadn't been fair of him, to bring it up while she was in the lull of her post-orgasm high, but he had done it anyway.

He hadn't expected her to ask him to leave.

He also hadn't expected her _not_ to react angrily.

Clary's emotions ran hot and cold, she felt things deeply.

He thought that maybe they would argue or fight if she didn't want to talk about it.

This was worse.

Because she had given him a small smile and tried to assure him that she wasn't angry at him, which felt like she was lying to him, even though it looked like she was trying to be genuine. Maybe she didn't think that she was angry at him, maybe she was suppressing it, but then that was even worse, because once the anger caught up to her, he could imagine that it wouldn't be pretty. She wasn't ignoring him—she replied to every text he sent and answered when he called. But her messages back were always brief and her voice on the phone always sounded a little detached.

Two weeks went by, and he didn't see her.

Jace picked up extra shifts at the garage, so that whenever he wasn't with his band, he was working. Some nights he would go to Alec's place and they would write songs, work on ones that they were still putting together or just watch TV and get high. Magnus was there on a couple of occasions that Jace went over, and the man seemed to have bounced back to his usual, energetic self. He didn't treat Jace any differently, so Jace wasn't sure if Clary just hadn't told him what was going on and that she was avoiding him or if he simply didn't care.

He was more inclined to believe that Clary hadn't told him, because he had seen the loyalty between the pair, and he knew that Magnus would back Clary up, one hundred percent, even if Jace wasn't sure what he was doing wrong other than _caring_ too much, apparently.

They'd had a gig on Friday night that had pulled in some good money. It was at a newer club in town that they hadn't performed at before, and that always made them feel a little uneasy, but it had gone off without a hitch. Isabelle and Raphael had done incredibly—Isabelle had pulled off the high notes in their new song perfectly—and Jace had a feeling that that was all down to Simon in the audience, standing between Kaelie and Magnus.

Clary wasn't there, but Jace didn't have time to think about that at the time, because he needed to throw everything he had into the gig.

On Saturday, they had another gig, and this time, Clary was there.

She was there before they went on, and she came backstage with Magnus and Simon when the boys had come to wish them good luck before they went on.

"Hey," Clary gave him a wide smile that looked genuine, but Jace still felt as though something was wrong. "I heard you've got some new songs you've added."

"Yeah, we put some together in the past few weeks," Jace nodded, wanting to keep the conversation going, even though it felt stilted. He opened his mouth to say something else, when then there was a shout from the door, one of the people who worked at the bar letting them know that they were about to be introduced. "Are you staying?" He asked her, getting up from the low couch he had been sitting on but not moving toward the door.

"Yeah," Clary nodded. "I'll be in the crowd, watching you work your magic," she glanced down at his hands which were gripping his drumsticks and she looked back up at him and wiggled her eyebrows. Jace couldn't help but let out a snort of laughter, because she had told him on countless occasions that she thought his fingers were magic. Clary grinned back at him and it felt like it had a few weeks ago, before whatever weirdness it was had descended on them. But then a few beats passed and neither of them said anything and it was just so _obvious_ that something had changed. "Good luck," she told him before backing out of the room, following Magnus and Simon back toward the main part of the bar.

"You good?" Alec asked, his words brisk as he rolled out his shoulders, touching the tips of his fingers with his thumbs. He used to play the guitar a lot more when they were on stage, so while now he focused mainly on the vocals, only occasionally bringing out his acoustic guitar for some of their softer songs, he still felt the need to keep his hands busy.

"I'm good," Jace jerked his head in a nod. Alec regarded him for a moment but he didn't have time to ask anymore because they needed to get out to the stage.

They played well.

Even better than they had played last night.

They concluded their set with _Vampires Kiss_ , one of their new songs, and Jace had a part where he smashed out on the drums for nearly a minute on his own, and he loved the vibrating sensation that flooded back through his fingers as he hit the drums in quick succession, finally ending with a slam of his foot on the bass drum pedal and on the ride cymbal.

Clary was dancing with Kaelie, she had been most of the night. She had been drinking most of the night as well, and her movements were getting a bit sloppy. Jace had been watching her throughout their set and he had met her eyes a couple of times. She had almost smiled widely back at him, but her gaze had quickly shifted, fixing them on Alec at the front of the stage or back on Kaelie. There were quite a few guys with their eyes on the two of them, and Kaelie definitely looked aware of it, although Clary didn't look particularly interested. Jace had to stop watching her because his mind kept switching between aroused and jealous.

"You were fucking great, babe," Magnus announced from where he was waiting for Alec and the rest of the band in the back room where all of their things were stored. Alec grinned at Magnus and leaned in to give him a hard kiss on the mouth. Magnus let out a half-annoyed groan as Alec's sweaty face rubbed against his but he accepted his kiss with a grin. After they had packed up their instruments, they headed out to the bar, Isabelle skipping off in front of them to find Simon.

"You want a beer?" Raphael asked as he began making his way to the bar.

"Yeah, just grab me whatever's on tap," Jace replied, lifting his voice to be heard over the music that was now coming out of the speakers. A couple of the girls he passed by gave him appreciative looks, and there was a guy who grinned at him and slapped him on the shoulder and yelled out 'good show'. Raphael nodded and kept going while Jace started winding his way towards the steps that lead down to the dance floor, behind Magnus and Alec. He got to steps, which weren't as crowded, and his eyes skimmed over the group for Clary.

He found the redhead easily, and his stomach squeezed when he saw her on the edge of the dance floor with Kaelie and talking animatedly with Isabelle and Simon. Jace watched them for a moment before locking his jaw and heading to the bar.

It was immature, but he told himself that she had come tonight to see him.

He was pretty sure it wasn't.

At least, not in it's entirety.

She was there to hang out with her friends and support her _other_ friends, which included her part time lover.

That shouldn't downbuzz him as much as it did.

Jace made his way over to the bar, to where Raphael was just getting the drinks pushed across the counter. One of the bonuses when playing at bars and clubs were the drinks were always on the house. Raphael grinned as he slid a big mug of beer across to him and he was juggling his own two mugs of beer and a fancy, tall glass with a little umbrella in it, that was undoubtedly for Isabelle.

"You good?" Raphael asked with a raise of his eyebrow. Jace just jerked his head in a nod as he circled his hand around the beer and lifted it to his lips. He swallowed back almost half the mug of beer before he felt a heavy hand on his shoulder. Jace pulled the mug away and looked over his shoulder, back at Alec.

"You just need to give her some time," Alec told him quietly. "She'll open up to you when she's ready." There was something about the way he said it that made Jace narrow his eyes.

"Magnus has told you what's going on," he surmised and Alec grimaced.

"Yesterday," he admitted quietly. Jace pursed his lips and looked back down at his beer, tapping his thumb against the side. He wasn't tempted to ask Alec what it was, because there was no way he wanted to hear it from his best friend, he wanted to hear it from Clary. Also, he knew that there was no way that Alec would betray Magnus' trust, and he never wanted to put Alec in that position. "You just need to give her space, let her know you're there for her."

"Yeah, but I don't know if she even _wants_ to tell me," Jace muttered. "I mean...It's not like we're in an actual relationship. Or, you know, on the breach of a relationship, like you and Magnus seem to be." Alec tilted his head from side to side, although Jace noted that he didn't dispute Jace's assumption of where he and Magnus were heading. That was a conversation for another day though.

"Do you _want_ to be in a relationship with her?" Alec asked with a raise of his eyebrows. "Coz that hasn't been something that you've really talked about..."

"I don't know..." Jace mumbled. "Maybe?" There was slight surprise on Alec's face, but he didn't look _totally_ shocked by the answer.

"Then you need to talk to her about it," Alec responded.

 **I have a few TV recommendations few guys, since we've been inside doing almost nothing else for the past few weeks. _Breeders_ is really funny in a total black comedy kind of way, although there's definitely a few things that hit a little close to home. And then there's _Car Masters: Rust to Riches_ which is this car show where they take cars and do them up into something crazy. Me just writing that sounds bland as shit, and I never watch this shows! Haha. We never watch car shows or anything, but this one is just different, the whole group is just really entertaining. There's two seasons, so yeah, just check it out to see if it's your thing!**

 **My top ten songs that I would recommend this time around are;**

 **1) _Smiling When I Die_ \- Sasha Sloan. 2) _Forever_ \- Fletcher. 3) _On_ \- BTS. 4) _Kissing Other People_ \- Lennon Stella. 5) _Pretend You're Missing Me_ \- Betty Who. 6) _Not In The Same Way_ \- 5 Seconds of Summer. 7) _Paper Hearts_ \- Tori Kelly. 8) _Cruel Intentions_ \- Delacey and G-Eazy. 9) _Ophelia_ \- The Lumineers. 10) _Highway To Heaven_ \- NCT 127.**

 **I hope you guys enjoyed the update! And the recommendations! I hope they provided a little bit of distraction in these...Weird times we're living in. Leave a comment, let me know what you thought of the update and please recommend songs and movies and TV series and whatever! I've heard from a few people that they've looked at other peoples recommendations and really enjoyed them, so it's not just me you're being a hero for right now! Haha.**

 **Much love from me to you x**

 **Tumblr: SereneCalamity**  
 **Twitter: CalamitySerene**


	16. Chapter 16

Clary lifted her arms and twisted her body from her waist a couple of times, tipping herself backwards as she braced her arms on her hips, listening as her back clicked a couple of times. She had just spent the past three hours working on a tattoo down a clients leg. It was a gorgeous tattoo that was taking three sessions to finish, and they were on their second session now. It was an array of roses, stretching from her hip and wrapping around her thigh into the inside of her calf.

It was beautiful, and Clary loved seeing it come to life, but it didn't mean her body didn't protest occasionally.

"Hey, girl," Magnus said with a grin as he stood in the doorway and leaned one shoulder against it. "How's it going? You done for the day?"

"Yeah," Clary nodded with a tired smile. "Just gonna clean up before heading out."

"I'll walk you home," Magnus told her. "I'm meeting Alec at that pizzeria near your place." Clary raised her eyebrows and grinned at him.

"You and Alec...Things are getting serious, right?" Clary pressed him lightly. "I mean, it seems like you guys are spending a lot of time together." Magnus didn't say anything for a moment, sucking his lower lip into his mouth and lifting on his hands to play with one of the jewels in his ear as though contemplating his next words.

"I'm gonna ask him out," Magnus announced, his voice a little abrupt and Clary's eyebrows rose even further, inching toward her hairline.

"Really?" She asked.

"Yeah," Magnus nodded firmly. "I'm gonna ask him to officially, you know, go exclusive with me. All that romantic shit. Although I guess it's not going to be that romantic because it's going to be over pizza, but they do a great chocolate mousse, I could wait for dessert," he winked and Clary just blinked at him. Clary didn't say anything for a long moment as she stared at Magnus, and then dropped her eyes back to where she had been cleaning all of her equipment.

"I thought that you had sworn off relationships. You know, after Camille," she was obviously trying to keep her voice light, as though this wasn't something that bothered her, but Magnus knew her better than that. He stepped into her room, getting closer to where she was standing.

"And I _had_ ," Magnus told her quietly. "But that was nearly _two years_ ago. Camille fucked me up with all her bullshit, but it was almost two years ago. It's time to move forward—life goes on, and all that shit." Camille Belcourt had been friends with Kaelie and she had flirted up a storm with both Magnus and Simon. Both of them had been interested in her, although Simon was on and off dating another girl at the time, Maureen Brown, and so he had given Magnus the go ahead. It turned out, after Magnus had been dating her for a year, that she was just stringing him along and waiting to see if Simon was going to break up properly with Maureen so that she could get together with him.

Simon had shut her down _real_ quick when Magnus had gotten drunk and told him and Clary about what he had found out, telling Camille in no uncertain terms that absolutely _nothing_ was going to happen between the two of them since her and Magnus had been dating. He wasn't interested in some heartless bitch who strung along one of the best men he knew. Camille had then tried kissing back up to Magnus, but he had broken up with her and thrown her stuff out of his apartment the next day, with help from Clary, who had personally wanted to set everything on fire, but Magnus had talked her down.

"I mean, just because I had one bad experience, doesn't mean everything else is going to be bad. One bad relationship doesn't mean they're all going to be that way...There _have been_ good relationships before..." Magnus' words were pointed, and Clary knew that he was saying them directly to her. _About_ her.

Not just about himself.

"We all have to move on at some point, Clare Bear," he whispered to her, using the nickname that she used to hear all the time when she was younger, from Magnus, and Simon...and Jonathan. Magnus moved her so that she was facing him and he rested his hands at her elbows. He slowly moved his fingers downwards, gently tugging at the gloves that she hadn't yet taken off and tossing them toward the bench. Her wrists were completely bare—not covered by the thin gloves, or the bracelets and watch that she would wear whenever she _wasn't_ wearing the gloves.

There were thick scars down her wrists, two on each arm, running parallel to her veins. Clary swallowed thickly as Magnus' thumbs brushed gently over the scars, and her mind flashed back to when she had woken up in the hospital bed and Magnus' worried face was the first thing that she had seen, before he was shouting for her mum and Luke and they were rushing to her side.

"Jace likes you. I think he _really_ likes you," Magnus said softly. "I think that he would be really good for you—and you'd be good for him as well." Clary swallowed again, and she felt tears spring to her eyes at his gentle words.

"It's not that simple, Mags," Clary told him, the words scratching in her throat. "You know that."

"I know, babe," Magnus murmured and he leaned in, dropping her hands and putting his arms around her, pulling her in for a tight hug. Clary let herself be hugged but she refused to let herself cry. She blinked a couple of times and pushed those tears back down. She pulled away first and Magnus cupped her cheek, giving it a slight squeeze. "Come on, let's get you home."

"Alright," Clary nodded and moved quickly around her room. She finished cleaning up her equipment and Magnus wiped down the seat where her client had been sitting and the arms of the chair before they headed out. Kaelie had already left since she hadn't had anyone come in for the past hour, so they were in charge of locking up before they began walking down the busy street, in the direction of Clary's apartment building. Magnus looped his arm through Clary's so that they weren't separated by the hordes of people.

They didn't walk fast, neither of them in a rush to get where they were going, just enjoying each others company. Magnus knew that Clary had a lot weighing on her heart—and he knew that it was also heavy on her mind—so he didn't push her to talk. When they got to her apartment building, Magnus offered to walk her to do her door, but she just rolled her eyes and told him to ' _go and get your man_ ' before giving him a kiss on the cheek and heading into the building.

Clary walked even slower to her apartment, dragging her feet up the stairs, mulling over Magnus' words.

She knew that things were going to get serious between Magnus and Alec sooner or later, she had seen the way that they acted when they were together. Hell, even that first night that she had met Alec she had seen the way he responded to Magnus. And she knew that she should be supportive, given her best friend had clearly fallen for a good guy.

It was just the fact that it was around the anniversary.

She always got like this around this time of year.

She was a lot better than she used to be—she was a _hell_ of a lot better than she used to be, she could admit that to herself now.

She was no longer on anti-depressants every day, and she no longer had those mornings where she physically couldn't drag herself out of bed. She no longer had those afternoons where she felt as though she was drowning and she couldn't bare to look at another person.

She no longer wanted to die, because she felt as though she couldn't handle the burden of life.

She didn't view life as a burden.

It was a gift, and most of the time, she was able to live it to the fullest. She had a job she enjoyed, she had friends who adored her and that she adored back, she had parents who loved her and somewhere, watching over her, she had a brother who had treasured her like she was the most precious thing in the world in the short time she had had with him.

 _He_ would want her to find someone to share all of this with.

Clary was close with her friends and she shared most things with them—nearly _everything_ , especially Simon and Magnus, but it wasn't the same as sharing with someone that you loved, and who loved you back.

And maybe that was something that she could have with Jace.

It was early days, but she still felt as though they had a good connection between them. Sure, most of the time that they were alone, they had sex, they didn't spend lots of time talking about the important things in life. But it wasn't as though they _never_ spoke. They would talk about all kinds of things, and he made her laugh. When they got high together, he would bounce ideas off her for lyrics, and she loved the way his fingers were almost always on the move, needing something to touch, to play with, just like when they were wrapped around the drumsticks.

Clary knew that she really should eat, but she wasn't hungry as she walked into her apartment. The place was a mess, and she knew that she should clean it up a bit, but that was one of the bonuses about living alone—she didn't have a roommate on her back about cleaning up.

Something else that she liked about Jace.

She could tell that he got a little OCD when it came to things being neat and tidy, just the way that he lined up his shoes when he took them off at the door, the way that he cleared up the rubbish or dishes almost as soon as they finished eating dinner, the way that he would put his clothes in a reasonably tidy pile before they slept—even if it wasn't _before_ they had sex, he made sure they were all together, sometimes folded, before they went to sleep.

But he didn't make any snide comments about her place, he respected that it was her area and she could treat it as she wanted.

Clary let out a long moan as she locked her door behind her and dropped her bag on the ground. She kicked off her shoes and pulled off her cardigan, letting them drop off and leave a trail behind her as she walked to the couch. She turned off her phone, not wanting anyone to send her a message and make her feel obligated to communicate, rolled a joint, and turned on the TV.

 **Hey, guys. Hope you enjoyed the update. Be kind and well.**


	17. Chapter 17

It had been a month since they had hung out in anything other than a group setting, and the texts were getting more strung out and a bit awkward. Jace didn't know what he was supposed to say to her, given he had asked her to meet up a few times near the beginning of their drawn out 'parting' and she had an excuse every time. He didn't know for sure that she didn't _actually_ have plans each of the times that he had asked her to hang out, but she didn't make any effort to reschedule. And she hardly ever text him first; there were actually only two occasions when she had—one time had been to ask what time they were going on stage, and that was after she couldn't get a hold of Isabelle, and the second time had been when she was looking for Magnus and she was wondering if Jace was with Alec and if Alec knew.

So things hadn't exactly been going well.

And whenever they were together, it wasn't _just_ in a group setting, it was always in a very _public_ setting. When they were coming to bars and clubs to watch them perform, or when the combined two groups of friends were going out for dinner or drinks, in a _very_ public place. She didn't act as though it was on purpose, but Clary never ended up sitting or standing anywhere near Jace. She didn't make a big deal of it, and Jace didn't want to go out of his way to sit next to her and make things awkward if maneuvered around people to get to her.

She hugged him goodbye, she let him kiss her on the cheek hello, she even shared a cigarette with him when the pair of them went out for a smoke with Magnus and Simon—but things were still off.

So when Alec said that Magnus was going to be bringing Simon and Clary around to the garage to watch them rehearse, Jace was completely taken aback. They hardly ever had people come to their rehearsals in general, muchless three people, but he wasn't going to argue.

Besides, he was pretty sure Isabelle would gauge his eyes out with her scary looking nails if he said anything, because her and Raphael were making _something_ work with Simon, and she got an excited look on her face whenever he was mentioned.

Raphael did as well.

Jace had never seen his friend smile as much.

In fact, that went for Alec as well.

All three of his closest friends—his bandmates, his family—were the happiest he had probably ever seen them and he was in a downward spiral because of a girl that he had had sex with a handful of times but who he knew relatively nothing about.

He needed to talk to her and get his head straight, because he couldn't just _switch this feeling off_.

And he decided to do that after the rehearsal.

* * *

"I like this song!" Clary called out to Simon, her voice barely able to be heard over the bang of the drums and rifts on the guitar and Alec's voice that were bouncing off the walls of the garage. Simon nodded, although it didn't seem as though he was listening all that hard because his eyes were glued on Raphael, who's fingers were moving across the guitar strings with extreme precision. Clary could understand the fascination, because it was something similar to what she had with watching Jace's fingers flex and change grip around the drumsticks he was holding, every now and then flinging them in the air in a practiced circles. She watched Raphael, like Simon was doing, and she could definitely see what Simon was attracted to, with his wide mouth and the playful way he tossed around his bright red hair.

But she was kidding herself if she told herself that he was anywhere near as attractive as Jace.

After practice wrapped up, Isabelle came over to where Simon was sitting and she leaned down to give him a hard kiss on the mouth. Clary's eyes widened and she couldn't smother her snort of amusement as she watched them. Simon had said that he wasn't too sure what was happening but that he really like the both of them and he just wanted to see where it was going, and Clary could completely support that, and it seems to be working out for him.

Her attention moved away from Simon and Isabelle, over to where Magnus was grinning and standing in front of Alec, leaning forward and playing with the strings of his hoodie and flirting, and then over to Jace. He was standing up behind his drum seat, idling circling one of the drumsticks around through his fingers, and his eyes were directly on her. Clary knew that she had to talk to him at some point—it wasn't even as though she was pointedly avoiding him, not after the first few weeks, they both had stopped texting very much at all—and so she decided now was as good as any. Clary walked around where Alec and Magnus were and came to stand in front of the drum set.

"Hey," she said to him, her voice a little tentative.

"Hey," Jace responded, and he smiled at her straight away, not holding back at all, and Clary felt her heart squeeze at that. "Hope it wasn't too loud."

"Well..." Clary let out a laugh as she looked around. "It was a little loud, but it must be hard to keep it quiet in here." They were in a garage, which wasn't insulated at all and so the sounds had been bouncing off the metal walls weren't all pretty, even though the actual music itself was good.

"Yeah, well, practice space is hard to find," Jace shrugged and made a face as he looked around. "We used to practice at Alec's but we were getting a lot of noise complaints, and then Hodge, that's my boss here, said we could practice here as long as we kept the place clean and didn't do it late into the night."

"Sounds like a good boss," Clary noted.

"He is," Jace agreed. "He's been letting me pick up extra hours as well, even though I'm technically only part time."

"Part time?" Clary raised her eyebrows. "You make enough from your gigs to only be part time?" Jace let out a laugh, because even though he knew that they were good at what they did, this was New York, and there were undiscovered bands around every corner, and the price of living was high, so the small amount of money that they made was gone pretty much as fast as it came in.

"Not really," he shrugged. "It's enough to get by, though."

"Hey—Jace? We're going to head out," Raphael spoke up, carrying his guitar in it's case in one hand and the other hand linked together with Isabelle's. Isabelle's other hand was holding Simon's, and Clary smiled again.

"Yeah, I'll catch up with you guys later," Jace said, looking past Clary and toward Raphael. Magnus came over to Clary and put his hand under her chin, turning her head so that he could press a kiss to her cheek and then waved at Jace before he and Alec filed out after the trio, leaving just Jace and Clary behind. Clary turned back to look at Jace and she gave him a smaller, slightly tense smile.

"Did you want to come back to my place?" She asked hesitantly. Jace stared at her for a moment before nodding his head.

"Yeah," he agreed. "Alright then." Clary's smile didn't look as tense then and she let out a subtle sigh of relief. Jace went around the garage, locking up the place and making sure all the windows were securely shut before he and Clary headed out the back door. It was almost ten o'clock at night on a Thursday, and the streets were absolutely buzzing with activity. Clary's apartment would have only been about a five or ten minute drive from the garage, but it would be an almost half hour walk.

Neither of them made any comment about getting a taxi or an uber, they both just started walking in the direction of her place. Jace would have suggested his place, but his was even further away.

They didn't really talk on the way back, except for a few off-handed remarks about some of the things they were passing or the drunk people that were hanging outside of bars. When they got back to Clary's place, Jace followed her inside, taking off his shoes and turning on the light as she headed directly for the couch.

"So, you work part time at the garage, and you are also part of a band," Clary began as she folded her legs on the couch and looked up at him. "Is that what you intended to do when you were in college?" He had mentioned before that he had been in university, but it was when they were both high and laughing about their worst sexual encounters. They had never gone any further into it than that.

"I studied music," Jace told her. "So I guess I'm using that degree in one of my jobs?" Clary let out a laugh.

"I guess so," she nodded. Jace looked around before seeing the little box that held Clary's bud sitting next to her bong. He raised his eyebrows at her in a question and she nodded, so he picked them up and put them on the chipped coffee table. He began unpacking the box, making moves to get the bong ready. "Was that what you always wanted to do?"

"Um..." Jace pursed his lips together, pausing his moments before he looked up at her with a small, almost embarrassed smile. "I actually wanted to be a teacher."

"Really?!" Clary's eyebrows flew up in surprise and Jace let out a laugh.

"Yeah," he shrugged a shoulder and looked down at his fingers, tapping them against the glass of the bong and then looking back up at Clary. "Yeah," he repeated, shrugging again, as though he was trying to act like it wasn't that big of a deal. "That's what I wanted when I first started my degree." Clary nodded, her eyes sliding to the side before she reached forward to pick up the remote from beside the little box that Jace was using.

"Wanna watch TV?" She asked him, switching the subject.

"You got any cheesecake?" Jace asked, giving her a sideways look.

"You and your weird cravings when you're high," Clary rolled her eyes with a laugh as she got up from the couch to walk over to her kitchen area. Jace couldn't help his small smile at the way she knew what his cravings were when he got the munchies. She opened up the freezer and pulled out a mini cheesecake. "This do?"

"Passionfruit?" Jace squinted to read the lid from the distance, not looking _overjoyed_ about the choice.

"Oh, well, sorry that I don't have any boysenberry! It's been a while since you've been over!" Clary shot back at him with a laugh and Jace rolled his eyes playfully, ignoring the slight twinge in his stomach.

"It'll do," he told her. Clary left the cheesecake out on the fridge to defrost and then came back over to sit down on the couch next to him. She flicked through Netflix before settling for _The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air_ , that she and Jace had been making their way through over the past few months. As they passed the bong back and forth between them, sliding it across the table, their knees bumping together and laughing together.

It was nice, and when they made their way over to her bed and undressed, they rolled into the bed with a pleasant buzz humming over their skin, and fell asleep almost straight away, with their feet pressed together at the bottom of the bed.

 **Heya, lovelies. Hope you enjoyed it. Be safe and kind.**


	18. Chapter 18

**Hey, guys :) I just want to apologize if I haven't replied to your reviews for previous chapters yet! I love replying to them individually but I also really wanted to update this week, so I will get through all of them together! xx**

Clary's eyes opened slowly on Friday morning, waking up naturally, given she didn't have an appointment until late that morning, so she hadn't needed to set her alarm before she had gone to bed. She took in a few breaths through her nose, blinking and rubbing at her eyes with her fists before her eyebrows pulled together as she noted a strange noise coming from inside her apartment. She lifted her head off the pillows that she had burrowed herself into last night, looking toward where there was light flooding into the apartment, and she found the source of the noise.

A guitar.

Clary sat up properly and looked toward the large windowsill on the far side of the apartment, beside the TV. Jace was sitting on the windowsill, one leg sprawled out the window and onto the fire escape and the other leg was folded underneath him. He was only wearing a pair of jeans, the button undone, and the sun that was streaming through the window was catching on his messy golden hair.

He looked gorgeous.

And the guitar that he was playing...

She glanced around, over to where her clothes from last night were in a pile on the floor—along with the rest of her clothes, because not much ever actually made it into the drawers—and she saw a dark blue shirt folded on the chair beside her bed, which she knew was Jace's. He almost always folded his clothes before they got into bed, only not doing it a few times when they had been completely distracted. She slid out of bed and padded softly over to where Jace was, dressed in an oversized concert tee-shirt that she slept in and a pair of sleeping shorts.

"I didn't know you played," she said quietly. Jace lifted his head from where it had been tipped forward, and he stopped playing so that he could take the cigarette out of his mouth and reach over to put it down in the ashtray.

"Not as well as Isabelle and Raphael, obviously," Jace answered with a shrug. "But me and Alec can both play okay. Isabelle taught me and Alec quite a bit when we were teenagers." He ran his long, nimble over the wires of the guitar. Clary didn't recognize the music he was playing, but it sounded pretty. It was something light and simple, but he played naturally, and Clary could honestly watch his fingers move over the strings all day.

"You're good," she commented with a smile. Jace gave her a small smile in return, a few strands hanging over his eye.

"I saw it over there—" Jace nodded to the far side of the apartment, behind her bed, where she had a free standing coat rail for her dresses and jackets, given she didn't have a built in wardrobe. "Hope it's okay." Clary licked her lips and shrugged a shoulder.

"It was my brothers, he used to play," Clary replied, pursing her lips together and turning to head toward her kitchen. A confused look crossed over Jace's face, but from the way that she had her back to him, Jace was guessing that this brother he had never heard of wasn't a conversation that she was willing to have. Clary filled up the jug with water and flicked it on and then picked up a coffee cup that was sitting on the bench. She looked into it, screwed up her nose and then went over to her cupboard to pull a clean one out. "You want coffee?" She asked, turning her head to look over her shoulder at him.

"Already got one," Jace picked up the coffee cup that was next to the ashtray that he had balanced on the windowsill in front of him. Clary nodded and then turned back to the bench. She let out a groan as she looked at the dishes and then stretched her arms above her head. As she put the plug into the sink and began running warm water, she lifted her voice to be heard over the water.

"So you play the drums, you play the guitar—any other instruments?" She aske him.

"I took saxophone lessons when I was in high school, but that was just through music class, so I was never that great. Other than drums...The next thing I'm best at is piano," Jace said. He slid off the windowsill, picking up the coffee cup as he walked into the kitchen.

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah," Jace nodded. "Haven't played it in a long time though. Mum and dad had one, an incredible one, and I loved playing on it. But given I don't really get back there anymore, and I don't know anyone else with one, and playing on a keyboard doesn't really do it justice, I don't really do it anymore. It's just not the same." He pursed his lips together, tapping his finger against the side of his coffee cup as he watched Clary scrub at a plate. "I told you yesterday I wanted to be a music teacher, right?" She stopped scrubbing so hard at the plate and she looked over at him, nodding slowly. She went back to cleaning the plate, but very slowly, obviously listening closely to what he was saying. "Mainly I wanted to be a piano teacher."

"What happened?" Clary asked carefully and softly, not wanting to push him too far.

"Eh," Jace shrugged a shoulder, moving so that he was standing behind her, leaning against her fridge. She had a mass of mismatched magnets over the fridge with a couple of photos stuck to it and a few take out menus, so he had to carefully lean against one side. "Life. There was this girl...She cheated on me for months. My dad used to cheat on my mum all the time, and it just fucked her up. They're still married, actually, although I have no idea why. It's kind of why I don't have anything to do with them anymore—I used to feel sorry for my mum and pissed at my dad, but she stays with him and pretends that everything is fine because she likes being a kept woman and I just can't deal with that shit."

"I get that," Clary put the plate on the rack and then picked up a pot, still not turning around to look at him, and he was glad. It was easier talking to the back of her head than seeing her face right now.

"Yeah...Well, it fucked me up for a while, really through me through a loop. My school work really took a hit and there was a semester when I was barely there and the only reason that I didn't have to repeat it was because Alec and Isabelle covered for me with some of my professors and so I didn't totally fail the attendance part," Jace admitted, and it felt kind of weird, saying all this to Clary. They never really spoke about things that were this serious, and this was one of the lowest periods of his life. "I managed to get enough credits to get my degree, but only just, and it was because I was doing so well at the beginning, or I would have been fucked. So now I just have a shit ton of student loans and two part time jobs to help pay them off." Clary was now done with the dishes and she turned around to look at him. The jug had sounded off, signalling that the water was boiled, but she was ignoring it.

"You never looked for a job as a music teacher? Pretty sure you would still be able to play for your band in the weekends," she prompted gently.

"There aren't many jobs going for a guy with completely average grades and references, plus the whole tattoos and piercings turn off a lot of people as well," Jace twisted his mouth and shrugged a shoulder, letting out a snort. "Guess I didn't really think that one through."

"It shouldn't matter," Clary stated and Jace met her eyes with a raised eyebrow. "I mean, I _know_ it does, but it shouldn't." He smiled at her but she didn't look very happy. "It pisses me off—there are so many fuckers out there who screw people over, dressed up in thousand dollar suits and fancy hair cuts and bloody dimples, but it's people who express themselves with art on their skin that get dirty looks."

"What you got against dimples?" Jace asked jokingly, showing off the dimple in his cheek with his smirk, and Clary just rolled her eyes at him, but it looked as though the frustration on her face ebbed away a little. "I know what you mean, but it is what it is."

"So you plan on working at the garage, then? And playing with your band?" Clary asked with a tilt of her head. Jace could see where she was coming from and how she might view his situation. She had a job that she absolutely loved and she worked with people that she loved. Not many people were lucky enough to have that—in fact, barely _anyone_ could say that. Some got one or the other, but not often both.

Obviously she didn't understand him settling, even if one of his incomes came from playing in his band.

"I love playing with Alec and Iz and Raph. They're my family," Jace said firmly. "If I could do that full time I would. Isn't that most kids dream? To be famous musicians? Make millions of dollars?" He grinned. "I like what we have—playing in bars and clubs. I would hate it if we got to the point where we might have to change our sound to fit some persons idea of us. And so, because we're small, I have to have another job. Hodge is great, I like the guys I work with, even if it's something that I'm overly interested in. I'm happy." Clary watched him for a moment and then she stepped forward. Her fingers reached out and skimmed up his arm.

"Don't give up on what you want—on your dream," she said quietly. It sounded sort of ridiculous, calling him wanting to be a music teacher 'a dream', but he guessed it was right.

"Don't worry, I haven't, Clary," he turned his hand, so that it was palm upward, and as her fingers slid down his arm, this time they played over his wrist for a moment, and then she slipped her figners between his. It was a sweet notion that made Jace give her hand a squeeze. "I've got a job interview in a few days time, but I've had a dozen of them, and never heard anything back."

"Well, don't stop trying," her words were soft and she lifted their twined hands until they were between their chests and she smiled as she dropped a soft, uncharacteristic kiss to his fingers. "And I want to hear you play piano some time—always knew those amazing fingers of yours couldn't just be used for playing drums."

"I'm pretty sure you're aware that they do more than play drums," Jace smirked down at her and Clary let out a laugh as she rolled her eyes.

"I'm trying to pay you a fucking compliment here," she snapped playfully at him. "I bet you're pretty fucking amazing."

"Fuck yeah I am," Jace grinned down at her and he loved the way her green eyes danced back up at him.

 **Let me know what you think x**


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